Terna responsible for developing the national electricity transmission grid has received authorization to shut off distributed generation systems in case of emergency.
Having broken ground last year, with an investment of US$6.6 million from the coffers of the New Zealand Ministry of Foreign Affairs & Trade Aid Programme, Tonga’s first and largest grid-connected solar park is to go online on July 24. The new solar power plant at the Popua Power Station, south-east of the island capital of Nuku’alofa on Tongatapu will have a total capacity of 1.3MW and will be supplied with Conergy Australia’s mounting systems.
PV module encapsulant materials supplier, STR Holdings has warned it will not meet previously guided second quarter 2012 revenue expectations. The company previously guided second quarter sales to be flat with the first quarter, being in the range of US$31-US$33 million, but revised this down approximately US$25 million. Management said that demand was weaker than expected.
A consortium of seven partners supported by €13.8 million in financing from the European Commission’s Seventh Framework Programme for European Research and Innovation are to build a solid state hydrogen storage plant designed to balance power supply and demand of renewable energy installed in the Puglia region of Italy, which employs around 3.5GW of solar, wind and biomass energy resources.
Subsequent to Italy’s energy agency Gestore dei Servizi Energetici's (GSE) 45 days notice to the domestic solar industry until the implementation of the revised Conto Energia, analysis from IMS Research has revealed that the country will have a severely reduced budget for incentive schemes. The new scheme was intended to be accompanied by an additional annual budget of €700m and is due to end when the total annual cost reached €6.7 billion. However, due to a large number of installations having been completed in the first half of this year in order to benefit from the previous Conto Energia’s generous rates, these have not yet been included in the official GSE statistics.
Eletrosul, Brazil’s energy utility, advised that it has chosen Portuguese electronics and engineer Efacec and its Brazilian unit, Efacec do Brasil, to build its 1MW solar park. The consortium won the bid for Megawatt Solar by acknowledging that it can build the project for a total of US$4 million.
Another solar company has fallen prey to the weakened economy, and like its predecessors Solyndra and Abound Solar, won’t be going quietly into the Nevada night. A report by the Las Vegas Review Journal has noted that one year after opening its doors, Amonix closed its 214,000 square foot North Las Vegas manufacturing plant, which was subsidized by over US$20 million in federal tax credits and grants. Amonix supposedly began selling equipment, including automated tooling systems and robotic welding cells in an online auction Wednesday.
Concerns of Chinese retaliation against US countervailing and anti-dumping duties have manifested themselves in a complaint filed to the Chinese Ministry of Commerce. MOFCOM has today released a statement regarding an application requesting an anti-dumping investigation into US and South Korean exports to China. On behalf of the Chinese solar industry, Jiangsu Silicon Technology Development, LDK Solar, Luoyan Sino-Silicon high-tech and New Energy, filed the complaint on July 2. Interested parties have 20 days to respond to the complaint.
The Export-Import Bank of the United States has okayed two loans, totalling US$57.3 million, which will see the exportation of US-made solar panels and ancillary services to Solar Field Energy Two and Mahindra Surya Prakash in India.
Waaree Energies revealed that it had landed a contract to deliver a 5.75MW turnkey thin-film solar PV plant for Shree Saibaba sugar factory in Latur, Maharashtra, India. No details were given as to a timeline for project completion.
