UK

The UK’s opposition Labour Party has pledged to almost treble the country’s solar PV capacity, taking it to 35GW by 2030.

The Swiss equipment maker has announced a fresh, CHF18 million order from Oxford PV but the news may have been strategically timed ahead of today’s update that it has completed the sale of its headquarters building.

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.

The long-duration energy storage provider plans to eventually build a portfolio of 50 MW/250 MWh liquid air systems throughout the United Kingdom.

Leading PV manufacturing equipment supplier Meyer Burger Technology has received a further CHF 18 million (US$18.2 million) from partner, Oxford PV for the purchase of key equipment for a 125MW integrated production line to fabricate high-efficiency perovskite HJT tandem solar cells.

In January, the U.K. Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy opened consultation on its solar-plus-storage proposals. To date, systems with a capacity bigger than 50 MW are classed Nationally Significant Infrastructure Projects.

Three scientists have been awarded the 2019 Nobel Prize in Chemistry for the development of lithium-ion batteries.

A report published recently by the United Kingdom’s National Infrastructure says that the UK’s regulatory system must “adapt to meet the demands of the future” by providing new powers for regulators to ensure utility investments in sustainable infrastructure. The report notes that without such powers, the country will be unlikely to meet its target of zero emissions by 2050.

The building-sized trucks run on diesel and prompt logistical complications as large amounts of diesel must be shipped to remote mining sites. Attempts to decarbonize the mining sector will have to consider the heavy-duty vehicles.

The company launched a solid-state battery in August it claimed could recharge itself to some degree from electrons in the air. Now ConFlow is preparing to test its devices with the help of artificial intelligence-powered monitoring devices in the new year.

American John B. Goodenough, Brit Stanley Whittingham and Akira Yoshino, from Japan, have received the Nobel Prize for Chemistry for developing the lithium-ion battery. A statement from the Royal Academy of Sciences of Sweden said the invention “laid the foundations of a society without wires and fossil fuels, and [they] are of great benefit to humanity”.

Chancellor Angela Merkel’s coalition is wavering on whether to focus on wind or solar power over the next decade to help Germany cut carbon emissions.

Ambitious proposals have emerged to power a major Angus pharmaceutical plant with electricity from a giant solar farm on land a few miles away.

The governmental body responsible for keeping mine pollution out of waterways has announced completion of the first phase of a plan to use solar to keep down its electricity bills.

MIT engineers have combined RFID (radio-frequency identification) tags with thin-film perovskite solar cells to create energy-harvesting IoT sensors.