News & Articles on Solar Energy
While I have primarily worked with wind energy, I have long been a proponent of renewable energy in the broadest sense. This includes solar energy. My work in Canada, especially Ontario, stressed inclusion of solar energy because it had been previously overlooked. At one time Ontario was one of the leading jurisdictions in North America developing solar photovoltaics due in part to the programs I and others pushed. The political winds changed and these policies were abandoned and with it Ontario’s progress toward a renewable energy future.
Solar Power Portal: Solar-generated electricity in the UK increases by 840 percent in one year
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Official statistics released by the Department of Energy and Climate Change show that the UK’s 1.38GW of installed solar capacity generated 0.5TWh of electricity in the second quarter of 2012 – an astonishing 840 percent increase from last year when solar contributed just 0.05TWh in the same period. . .
Grist: Why is rooftop solar cheaper in Germany than in the U.S.?
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Most of those differences can be attributed to policy, either directly or indirectly. PV installations don’t pay sales tax in Germany. Rules governing permitting and interconnection are much simpler. And of course there’s the biggie, which is German feed-in tariffs, whereby customers who install rooftop solar are guaranteed a high rate of return for the lifetime of the system. . .
Solar Server: Bulgaria retroactively cuts PV feed-in tariff rates up to 39%
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The nation of Bulgaria has introduced new, temporary feed-in tariff rates, including cutting the rates for solar photovoltaic (PV) plants above 200 kW by 5-39%. These rate reductions were decided at a closed session of the Bulgarian Energy and Water Regulatory Commission (SWERC). The new rates went into effect on September 18th, 2012, and will apply to previously commissioned plants. . .
Denmark Reaches 2020 Goal for Solar Energy before Time
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Huge interest for solar energy solutions has made the amount of solar cells multiply much faster than expected. This is made possible by favourable framework conditions. In fact the solar cell capacity will be a hundred times bigger this year compared with 2010. Currently 36 MW capacity are being mounted every month. . .
PV-Tech: Solar power provides 8.4% of Italian electricity demand in August, report shows
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According to a monthly report from Italian grid operator Terna SpA, solar power provided 8.4% of total Italian electricity demand in August. It also revealed that electricity generated from PV during that month grew by 49.2%, from 1,501 GWh in August 2011 to 2,240 GWh in August 2012. . .
Renewables International: More onshore wind needed
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Bernard Chabot
French energy expert Bernard Chabot takes a look at German power production over the past 12 months and finds that an increase in onshore wind would make the supply of renewable power more reliable. . .
Italian Solar Generation Surpasses Wind for First Time
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Paul Gipe
Renewables Now Meet One-Quarter of Italy’s Electricity Supply–Solar Produces Nearly Twice Italy’s Famed Geothermal Power Plants–Italy’s Per Capita Solar Five Times that of California . . .
REWIRE: Why California is Way Behind Germany In Solar Development
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In the meantime, the example of Germany is worth keeping in mind when you hear utilities laud their cooperation with California’s pilot feed-in tariff programs (while fighting their expansion in Sacramento). In California, we’re talking about 750 megawatts here, 190 megawatts there of feed-in tariff programs, and critics talk about the cost. As long as we trade in such penny-ante programs, Germany is far outracing us in solar development, even as it rethinks and retools its own programs, expensive precisely because they work. . .
Renewables International: The shift towards large systems
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Bernard Chabot
French expert Bernard Chabot analyzes and comments on the potential impacts on PV arrays size diversity of the PV installations in Germany from 2009 to the end of June 2012. . .
Cleantechnica: Japanese Home Improvement Co. Launches Billion-Dollar Solar Power Plant Program
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Solar and renewable energy market participants and observers have been expecting a boom in investment and demand in Japan in the wake of the Japanese government’s July introduction of a renewable energy feed-in tariff (FiT) program, which includes a higher than expected rate schedule for solar power installations. That boom’s beginning to materialize, as a growing roster of Japanese and overseas-headquartered businesses from within and outside the solar/renewable energy space announce plans to enter and ramp up their investments and activities. . .
