Oceania

Luminous Energy has commenced connection works on its 162MWac solar farm in Australia, with the developer eyeing up 1.2GW of works across multiple markets.

Sungrow locked in a 100MW residential inverter distribution deal at last week’s All-Energy Australia, the company revealed, bolstering its position in the lucrative market.

The uptake of solar power around the world is certainly a good thing for the planet, but that doesn’t mean it is without environmental consequence either. Some solar panel components are more easily recycled than others, and scientists in Australia may have just figured out how to repurpose one of the trickiest and most valuable: the silicon that serves as its semiconductor.

The Australian utility-scale PV and wind industries have just gone through a record two years of construction and commissioning. More specifically, writes Rystad Energy’s David Dixon, utility-scale PV has transformed from a megawatt-scale market to one measured in gigawatts. The resultant boom in utility-scale PV in the country has attracted developers, EPCs and OEMs, from at home and across the globe.

The Chinese manufacturer has officially unveiled its high-efficiency product in Melbourne after celebrating a 13.6 MW panel order from the nascent Hungarian PV market.

Nordgold intends to build a 13MW PV plant with battery storage that will provide power to its Burkina Faso gold mines, thanks to an agreement signed with Total Eren and equity investor Africa Energy Management Platform (AEMP) on Tuesday.

Lightsource BP has signed financing agreements to develop its maiden utility-scale solar project in Australia.

A German start-up achieved more than 99% efficiency when charging a vehicle developed by the Bochum University of Applied Sciences with electricity from solar cells. Ambibox’s DC charging technology was used in a research project in the Australian desert.

Analyst WoodMac has spelled out the urgent need to decarbonize the global hydrogen production industry. While the fuel can offer a sustainable grid balancing act for intermittent renewables, in its current fossil-fuel driven form it is pumping out more than 800 tons of carbon into the atmosphere every year.

The Solar Team of the Eindhoven University of Technology won the World Solar Challenge in Australia in the cruiser category. This is the fourth year in a row that the Eindhoven team won gold in this category for family solar-powered cars, the university announced on Twitter.

Although the International Energy Agency’s latest renewables report forecasts impressive solar growth there is still a nagging feeling it has produced conservative estimates and the emphasis on sharing costs with grid operators is predictable.

An Australian utility is to develop a 60MW solar farm that will be connected to two iron mines in Australia, transforming them into the first to be run entirely by renewables during the day.

GES to build 97MW solar plant for Engie in Chile. Sterling & Wilson bags 200MW EPC order in Australia. BHEL tenders for Floating solar equipment at Indian coal plant. ACC and Hyperion for JV in Hong Kong.

A solar car competing in the World Solar Challenge has rolled over on the Stuart Highway, just north of Coober Pedy in South Australia.

Having begun on 13 October and being due to end on 18 October, the Bridgestone World Solar Challenge is underway.