Asia

A consortium led by Metito Utilities, JinkoSolar and Al Jomaih Energy and Water has won a tender to build a 45-55 MW grid-tied solar plant with a bid of $0.0749/kWh — the lowest ever seen in Bangladesh.

First Solar reported a bumper quarter during Q2 by most metrics. The company’s net sales of $585 million were nearly double the previous year, on shipments 1.4 GW of product – the most in its history. Additionally, First Solar booked more than 2.1 GW of orders in July alone, a very positive start to Q3.

Major China-based polysilicon producer, Xinte Energy has signalled a significant decline in expected profits for the first half of 2019, due to polysilicon ASPs declining 43% from the prior year period.

French floating PV specialist Ciel&Terre is teaming up with SCG, an Asian petrochemical company, to develop floating solar plants at hydroelectric dams in Thailand.

The global power and renewable energy market is expected to remain largely unaffected by the Trump administration’s new wave of tariffs on Chinese goods. Although shipments of Chinese modules into the U.S. market are falling, Chinese manufacturers sent more panels to overseas markets in the first half of this year than they did in the same period of 2018. Analysts from Fitch, meanwhile, claim the U.S. solar market will continue to expand, despite higher project costs.

The winning developer will be able to use solar modules and cells of any origin for the plant, which will be built in Auraiya district, in the Indian state of Uttar Pradesh. Bidding closes on Sept. 5.

‘Solar Module Super League’ (SMSL) member JA Solar has supplied its bifacial double-glass PERC modules to a 2.5MW rooftop project at a Goodyear tire manufacturing facility in Shah Alam, Malaysia, the country's largest such project.

Ongoing US-China trade tensions will not ruin solar fortunes on either side as players adapt by redrawing the lines of global supply flows, Fitch Solutions has predicted.

The Solar Energy Corporation of India (SECI) has issued another tender, seeking PV developers to help develop 1.5GW of solar projects across the country. This latest tender stands as part of the second phase of the Central Public Sector Undertaking (CPSU) program.

With grid capacity a limiting factor, the Middle Eastern country has moved to foster private-to-private solar projects to meet industrial power demand.

A report by Greenpeace has found in the five years since China announced the continent spanning ‘One Belt, One Road’ infrastructure plan, investment in Belt & Road countries has supported 12.6 GW of wind and solar power generation capacity. That is almost three times the 450 MW that came online in the territories before 2014. The initiative has also supported 68 GW of new coal capacity.

The state-owned China News Service today reported almost $80 million is left in the pot for large scale project subsidies this year despite almost 420 facilities with a combined generation capacity of 1.77 GW having missed out in the auction.

Indian and Australian solar will spearhead a grid parity shift set to take hold of Asia-Pacific renewables within less than a decade, according to Wood Mackenzie.

Quasi-governmental body the CPIA has released first-half figures for the world’s biggest solar marketplace which show production volumes for export markets continuing to expand and the domestic picture set to rebound after public solar subsidy levels were published.