IRENA: China, US, EU shed jobs but India, Southeast Asia and Brazil see gains in year when off-grid solar rose to fore as potentially major future employer.
Chinese PV manufacturer Trina Solar has signed a memorandum of understanding (MoU) with Thailand-based developer Thai Solar Energy to be the exclusive supplier of solar modules for a 155MW solar plant in Onikobe, Japan.
Tokyo’s main power company is using blockchain distributed ledger technology to assess how customers on its new renewable energy tariffs could use solar, batteries and electric vehicles to trade energy via the grid.
Thanks to “innovative business models” and the combination of PV with batteries, Japan’s “solar boom” is far from over, market expert Izumi Kaizuka of RTS PV has said.
Panasonic is transferring a 90% stake in its heterojunction (HIT) solar cell and module assembly plant in Malaysia to China-based PV manufacturer, GS-Solar as part of wider collaboration on HIT production expansion and R&D.
Japanese conglomerate invests in GridMarket, a company focused on distributed generation projects using battery storage, solar PV, fuel cells, and combined heat and power.
Leading CdTe thin-film manufacturer and ‘Solar Module Super League’ (SMSL) member, First Solar reported significantly lower than expected first quarter sales, due primarily to challenges in its EPC PV project business in the US and Japan that impacted sales by US$159 million.
Japan has called on India to immediately review its safeguard duty on imported solar cells to ensure that products that have different characteristics from solar cells are excluded from the measure.
Canadian Solar subsidiary Canadian Solar Projects K.K. has expanded and renewed its credit facility with a syndicate of four finance leasing institutions led by Sumitomo Mitsui (SMFL), a member of Sumitomo Mitsui Financial Group.
