Asia & Oceania

The European Commission has rejected a request by EU ProSun to replace the pricing benchmark used to determine the minimum import price applied to Chinese solar products sold in the EU.

A project developer has bid for solar capacity in the Indian state of Andhra Pradesh for a game-changing INR 4.79/kWh (US$0.073), which takes solar to grid parity with other major sources of power generation in India, sources have confirmed to PV Tech.

The Thai government has opened its doors to prospective solar project developers, who have registered their interest in building the first and largest portion of 800MW of PV projects in the country through an auction process.

Australia’s environment minister Greg Hunt has hinted that his government has a new “positive agenda” in support for renewables, while speaking at the Bloomberg New Energy Finance ‘Future of Energy Conference’ in Shanghai, China, today.

Major PV inverter manufacturer Sungrow recently held a themed PV summit “Embracing the Thailand PV Industry; Enjoying the Future”. The event brought together government agencies, grid operators, industry companies, financing institutions, technical experts and all interested industry players.

A heterojunction c-Si solar cell with a conversion efficiency of 25.1% has been showcased by its maker at an event hosted by the Japanese government to exhibit technological innovations in “new energy”.

India-based project developer ACME Solar Holdings has won the highest capacity of projects in yesterday’s solar auction in Uttarakhand with four projects totalling 50MW combined out of the 171MW awarded.

All the winning bids in the latest 170MW Indian state solar auction in Uttarakhand have remained below the INR6/kWh (US$0.09) tariff, despite several bankers commenting on previous auctions that only prices of INR6-6.5 per unit would be workable given India’s market conditions.

India’s energy ministry has amended its invitation for state-owned corporations (CPSUs) to set up 1GW of solar PV plants across India, by bringing forward its funding timelines.

The largest polysilicon producer GCL-Poly Energy Holdings has secured approximately US$110 million from a new corporate bond from qualified investors in China.