News

Electricity produced from commercial and industrial solar energy systems is now cheaper in Chinese cities than that supplied by the national grid.

Solar tile manufacturer 3 in 1 Roof has passed UL 1703 safety testing for its solar roofing tiles. The company claims its solar roof system is eight-times lighter than traditional tile roofing materials and can withstand 200+ mph winds.

Quick Mount PV, an American manufacturer of solar roof mounting and racking systems, is launching the new QRail Tilt System. Quick Mount PV’s QRail Tilt System allows installation of the QRail Racking System on a variety of low slope commercial and residential roof types — the most common type of commercial roof type in the United States.

Fronius is bringing its new hybrid Primo GEN24 inverter to Salt Lake City for Solar Power International 2019. The new solution provides all the benefits of the SnapINverter and additional features, such as being incredibly compact, easily scalable, quick to commission via an app, and easily serviceable. This new all-in-one hybrid inverter combines the functions of multiple devices in one compact device: battery charger, battery inverter, controller and the intelligence to be the operating system of your home’s energy supply. However, the product won’t be available to the public until 2020.

Within the first day of accepting applications, California’s new Solar on Multifamily Affordable Housing (SOMAH) program is nearly fully subscribed, having received more than 240 applications representing over 74 MW of solar power generating capacity and $163 million in reserved funding.

PV Hardware has introduced its new dual-row solar tracker, Axone Duo, which combines features of its Axone and Monoline mounting products. This confluence results in a tracker with a better balance of controllers and motors between the two types of photovoltaic trackers, establishing a single row of up to 128 modules for each solar tracker.

San Jose Clean Energy (SJCE) and EDP Renewables SA (EDPR), through its fully owned subsidiary EDP Renewables North America, signed a 20-year power purchase agreement for 100 megawatts of new solar energy and 10 MW of battery storage at the Sonrisa Solar Park in Fresno County, California. The project is anticipated to be operational in 2022.

SMA has unveiled a new and improved version of its Sunny Boy-US line of inverters, part of the company’s Power+ residential solar offering. The new Sunny Boy will offer the latest technology and include enhanced safety features to comply with current industry regulations.

This new development has brought the country’s cumulative installed solar capacity to more than 9.5 GW. Around 91.5% of the newly installed capacity is represented by PV systems below 1 MW in size.

A new report from analysts at Wood Mackenzie forecasts 6.6 GWh of residential energy storage to be installed across Europe by 2024. The economics of the technology are at a tipping point, increasingly reaching grid parity in European markets. With rising electricity demand and falling battery system costs, the trend will further spread across the continent and fuel an uptick in demand.

The 10 MW facility is located in Tozeur, in southern Tunisia. The project was also financed by the German development bank KFW under Tunisia’s solar program Plan Solaire Tunisien (PST).

Researchers at the University of Massachusetts Amherst’s College of Information and Computer Sciences (CICS) have developed a method for automatically assessing rooftops for solar potential.

On July 29, the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals affirmed the lower court’s decision in Winding Creek Solar LLC v. Peterman et al., ruling that California’s feed-in tariff for small qualifying facilities (QFs), the Renewable Market Adjusting Tariff (ReMAT), violates the federal Public Utility Regulatory Policies Act (PURPA) (Ninth Circuit Case No. 17-17531).

Sixteen members of Utah Associated Municipal Power Systems (UAMPS) are further decarbonizing their energy portfolios by adding solar electricity from a new project in southeastern Utah.

The city council of Satellite Beach, Fla., has unanimously passed a resolution committing the city to transition to 100% clean, renewable energy for the entire community by 2050 and for municipal operations by 2032.