California

California has hit a significant milestone this year: more than one million rooftop solar installations on homes, schools, businesses, and farms. With California leading the way, the U.S. reached two million installations this year.

The site of two controversial development proposals that never came to pass is now slated to be filled with solar panels and computing storage buildings.

An idea to build solar panels into manufactured homes has given a Portland-based company a big win in a year-long national competition.

Solar developer CalCom Energy has put forward a new US$100 million fund to help build solar and energy storage projects to benefit farming communities in California.

Los Angeles’ municipal utility has tripled the size of its rooftop solar feed-in programme (FiT), growing it from 150MW to 450MW.

Lightsource BP has secured US$140 million financing for a portfolio of seven utility-scale PV projects across the US.

Solar Integrated Roofing Corporation (SIRC) has completed the acquisition of The Montross Companies, an establishing roofing company in San Diego.

Solar Frontier Americas has acquired a 50.5MW PV project purchased from CS Solar, a JV company of Samsung Solar Energy. The installation is located in Stanislaus County, California, just a few hours southeast of San Jose.

Electrical engineer Aaswath Raman, at the University of California in LA, has come up with a device that can harness energy from a dark night sky to power an LED — hinting at a new frontier in renewable energy.

Solaria Corporation is to work towards a doubling of its panel manufacturing capabilities this year, a push financed by a new capital raise.

The US renewables business of Japanese oil and gas major Idemitsu Kosan has bought a 100MW solar project in Colorado from GCL New Energy, a subsidiary of China's GCL New Energy Holdings.

California Governor Gavin Newsom signed into law last week financial protections for consumer investments in rooftop solar energy. The law, AB 1208 authored by Assemblymember Phil Ting (D-San Francisco), extends a prohibition on cities and counties taxing the energy generated by rooftop solar panels for use by homeowners and businesses.

The 100-megawatt club is about to get a lot busier. Here are the world’s eight largest battery storage projects.

A new coating developed by scientists at Stanford promises to bring lithium metal batteries ‘closer to reality’, by significantly extending their operational lifetime and limiting the occurrence of dendrites at the anode, which can cause short circuiting and fires.

Tara Doyle started her career in the solar energy industry more than 15 years ago, and today serves as the chief commercial officer at PVEL, which claims to be one of the first testing laboratories to focus on bankability for the downstream PV buyer community. The lab serves developers, financiers, O&M companies, asset owners, and insurers.