A key theme of the Berlin Energy Transition Dialogue conference last week was how Germany’s Energiewende (‘energy transition’) has not only proven how to foster an explosion of renewable generation capacity through support schemes, but also how to integrate those renewables. Grid operators from Germany and Denmark discussed questions of feasibility, past, present and future.
The chief of California’s bulk transmission system operator has slammed net metering as a “subsidy” of wealthy households by poorer ones, claiming it represents an “economic justice issue”.
Puerto Rico’s financially troubled electric power authority PREPA will install a large-scale battery park at a 10MW PV farm, to help integrate the farm’s output and other renewables.
Recharge A/S, an investment fund specialising in renewables, will take a 50.1% stake in a €24 million (US$26.7 million) micro grid on a remote Portuguese island that could prove the validity of such projects as an asset class.
The Solar Energy Corporation of India (SECI) has invited expressions of interest for what may be India’s first utility-scale energy storage project to be combined with a solar and wind hybrid project at Rangreek in the mountainous state of Himachal Pradesh.
Japan's PV industry is changing fast. The feed-in tariff has brought about over 30GW of installed capacity, with large-scale solar outnumbering residential by about 10 to one. Ahead of this week's PV Expo in Tokyo, Andy Colthorpe takes a look at some of the issues expected to dominate.
Lichtblick, a retailer of ‘green electricity and green gas’ headquartered in Germany, is looking to take its concept for integrating multiple distributed generation sources into a single network into international markets.
Tech giant Apple has said that solar and energy storage projects will be among the priorities for expenditure under its inaugural green bond, which the company issued earlier in the week to the tune of US$1.5 billion.
Holland’s national grid operator has said that batteries will be an “excellent alternative” to conventional power plants in providing balancing services, especially as a complement to increased solar and wind deployment.
Schneider Electric will provide a 1MWh energy storage system to be paired with a PV system from Duke Energy-backed REC Solar in the latest project to show how renewables-integrated microgrids can work.
