Renewable power firm Lark Energy has installed two electric car charging ports bolstered by solar PV panels at its headquarters in Lincolnshire, the company announced yesterday. The firm said the new car ports could complement existing EV charge points at the site and would help it to increase the use of electric vehicles in its own fleet. Moreover, the solar energy generated by the car ports are designed to be fed into the grid to be used as part of the firm’s energy consumption at the site, including delivering power to the EV charge points themselves. Paul Adams, joint managing director of Lark Energy, said the innovation had the potential to be installed at further car parks and EV charge points across the country as take-up of battery-electric transport grows in the coming years.
Business Green 12th April 2017 read more »
The residential solar-plus-storage market has certainly received a lot of attention in recent months. With the release of new, lower-cost products and implementation of utility time-of-use and demand-charge rate structures, the overall economics of solar photovoltaics (PV)-plus-storage systems continue to improve—but questions remain as to what’s ultimately needed to achieve widespread deployment. To better understand this market evolution, Rocky Mountain Institute (RMI) explored the services and value battery energy storage can provide, and is collaborating with the National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL) on further research that examines the costs—and value—of PV-plus-storage systems.
RMI 12th April 2017 read more »
Solar employs more U.S. workers than Apple, Google, and Facebook combined. The global solar market has soared 30-fold in just nine years. The rapid rise of solar power is one of the most astonishing transformations in the history of global energy use. A decade ago, solar photovoltaics (PV) was just a tiny sapling, easily dismissed by fossil fuel advocates. Today, after a remarkable 30-fold increase in PV sales in just nine years, it has become a giant redwood forest.
Think Progress 12th April 2017 read more »
The price of solar power in India fell to a record low of 3.15 rupees (5 U.S. cents) a kilowatt-hour in a competitive tender where French firm Engie SA’s local arm won rights to develop 250 megawatts. Power Minister Piyush Goyal confirmed the results on Twitter, saying the prices bid were a record low in the auction in the southern state of Andhra Pradesh. The result is part of Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s ambition to install 175 gigawatts of renewables by 2022 and will spur discussion about whether India can rely on solar for more of its electricity. Engie bid under the name Solairedirect Energy India Pvt, according to Bridge to India, a research firm that tweeted a list of companies involved. An official at Engie had no public comment.
Bloomberg 12th April 2017 read more »