analysis

Reporting its Q1 2021 results last week, JinkoSolar provided a snapshot of the pressures solar module manufacturers have faced in the opening exchanges of the year by way of spiralling material and freight costs. Liam Stoker analyses how the company has responded, laying the groundwork for a return to normality towards the end of the year.

Solar will likely play a major role in achieving Japan’s policy goal of reducing greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions to zero by 2050 and could reach 130GW to 160GW in cumulative deployments by the 2030 financial year.

The world will need to build five to six times as much solar and wind power per year as in 2019 if a carbon-zero economy is to be reached by the middle of the century, a study has said.

The solar sector’s Q2 results season showed that, for the most part, the pandemic’s impact on deployment in the US was restricted to early in the quarter, helping many companies post better-than-expected performance in Q2. But as Liam Stoker suggests, COVID-19’s tail could be longer than anticipated.

Last week saw the publication of both AEMO’s Integrated System Plan and National Grid ESO’s Future Energy Scenarios, two documents which project the evolution of Australia and the UK’s national grids. Liam Stoker compares the two and identifies the mutual lessons to be learned.

Production of green hydrogen using renewable power for electrolysis could be cost competitive with incumbent methods by 2030, analysis by research firm IHS Markit has concluded.

Governments should focus on mini-grids as a means to enabling access to reliable electricity for hundreds of millions of people that don’t yet have it and mini-grids using solar and batteries have matured as a technology class, but financing such projects remains problematic, a new report has found.

Regulator’s new figures show renewables will account for 25% of all US electrical capacity by 2022 whereas coal will drop to 18.63%, according to analysis by Sun Day Campaign.

Feed-in tariffs (FiTs) in Japan for solar PV systems have now been provisionally set by the national Ministry of Energy Trade and Industry (METI) for the next financial year, which begins in April.

Claims that net-zero goal and 2.5TW of PV are ‘technically and economically feasible’ by mid-century come as reports suggest Beijing could axe large-scale PV subsidies next year.