From pv magazine Germany

South Korea-based solar module manufacturer Hanwha Qcells is still in patent litigation with photovoltaic competitors in various regions of the world over possible infringement of its patents for a passivation technology.

Now, it also owns the intellectual property rights to Laser Enhanced Contact Optimization (LECO) technology thanks to the finalization of the acquisition of Cell Engineering (CE).

CE started to develop this manufacturing process in 2017 and cooperated than with Hanwha Qcells in transfering it to mass production.

The LECO technique is reportedly able to raise PERC and TOPCon solar cell efficiency by between 0.2% and 0.5%. It reportedly achieves a high throughput through a lean and cost-effective laser treatment.

South Korea-based solar module manufacturer Hanwha Qcells is still in patent litigation with photovoltaic competitors in various regions of the world over possible infringement of its patents for a passivation technology.

Now, it also owns the intellectual property rights to Laser Enhanced Contact Optimization (LECO) technology thanks to the finalization of the acquisition of Cell Engineering (CE).

CE started to develop this manufacturing process in 2017 and cooperated than with Hanwha Qcells in transfering it to mass production.

The LECO technique is reportedly able to raise PERC and TOPCon solar cell efficiency by between 0.2% and 0.5%. It reportedly achieves a high throughput through a lean and cost-effective laser treatment.

“After working very closely with CE, the acquisition of the company by Qcells felt like the next logical step in order to fulfill the complete potential of the LECO technology,” said Jörg Müller, head of Qcells R&D.

“However, Qcells does not tolerate any unlawful usage of the LECO technology, and is fully committed to defending its intellectual property rights to ensure that the solar industry can continue to pursue its research and development activities with confidence,” said Merfeld.

Total corporate funding – including venture capital funding, public market and debt financing – for the solar industry experienced a 55% year-on-year increase in Q3 2023 and is currently valued at $28.9 billion, up from last year’s $18.7 billion in Q3 2022, new analysis by Mercom Capital Group reveals.

The total corporate financing deals, however, decreased by 5% year-over-year, with only 124 in the first nine months of 2023 compared to 131 over the same period in 2022.

According to Mercom Capital Group CEO Raj Prabhu, the solid results from the first three quarters of 2023 were due to a “strong push” towards global decarbonization and incentives from the North American Inflation Reduction Act. “M&A activity, on the other hand, has faced adverse effects, especially in the realm of project acquisitions, due to increased due diligence, higher costs, delays, and a tight labor market,” he said.

“Project developers and independent power producers were the most active acquirers of solar projects in Q3 2023 – picking up 2 GW – followed by insurance companies, pension funds, energy trading companies, industrial conglomerates, and IT firms with a total of 1.6 GW,” Mercom states.

“Investment firms acquired 959 MW; electric utilities acquired 877 MW; and oil and gas companies acquired 759 MW of projects.”

During the first three quarters of this year, there were fewer venture capital funding activity deals – 51 in the first nine months of 2023 compared to 72 over the same 2022 period – but this value increased 4% year-on-year, representing $5.7 billion in Q3 2023 compared to $5.5 billion in Q3 2022.

There were 10 solar top venture capital securitization deals totaling $3.2 billion in Q3 2023 compared to eight deals totaling $2.3 billion in Q3 2022, representing a 39% year-on-year increase. A total of 166 solar top disclosed mergers and acquisitions, comprising 31.6 GW, occurred in 9M 2023. This is compared to 207 projects acquired, comprising 52.2 GW, in 9M 2022.

Mercom Capital Group, a US-based communications and renewable energy research firm, publishes its Solar Funding and M&A Reports on a quarterly basis.

Italy finds itself 10 to 12 years behind other nations when it comes to renewables development and installation figures, thanks to a distrust of renewable energy generation versus more recognized forms of energy production, primarily nuclear, gas, and “clean coal.”

Finally, though, acceptance of the necessity of clean power is dawning. Italy will need to add 50 GW of solar generation capacity by 2030 as part of 70 GW of new clean power facilities needed to meet European targets.

A notoriously sluggish permitting system has resulted in less than 1.5 GW per year of new photovoltaics, with around 800 MW added in 2020 and 940 MW in 2021, rising to around 2.5 GW last year. Residential solar, at least, has advanced markedly in the last two years.

The government has also set a target of sourcing 55% of Italian-generated electricity from renewables by 2050.

Solar has been boosted by regional residential-PV incentives and a move to simplify permitting for clean energy plants under the procedura abilitativa semplificata (PAS), which came into force in April 2022.

Italy’s European Union-funded, post-Covid economic recovery plan, the Piano Nazionale di Ripresa e Resilienza (PNRR) – approved in July 2021 – allocated €1.5 billion ($1.6 billion) for the installation of solar on agricultural buildings, referred to as “agrisolar,” and €1.1 billion for agrivoltaics. None of the PNRR funds were allotted to conventional, ground-mounted solar parks.

That was mainly because of permit delays for conventional ground-mounted solar. While the PNRR millions fired the starting gun on agrivoltaic projects with a generation capacity of more than 1 MW, the drawn-out nature of the “autorizzazione unica” central permitting process for photovoltaics, and the diverse planning policies of local governments, have led to inevitable development hold-ups for ground-mounted solar.

Project clusters

The PAS has at least shaken things up, with many projects that were awaiting autorizzazione unica approval withdrawn and resubmitted as clusters of smaller sites, with generation capacities no larger than 20 MW in order to be eligible for the simpler permitting process. Numerous projects, in fact, have reappeared with a capacity ceiling of 14 MW, as securing connection to the medium-voltage grid is far easier than to the high-voltage network applicable to larger sites.

The raised cost of agrivoltaics reflects the fact panels cannot be as tightly packed as in conventional ground-mounted sites, due to the requirements of the crops planted under and between them.

Expensive

INTEC Energy Solutions' experience is that agrivoltaic installations with panels installed anywhere from 2.1 m to 6 m off the ground require 30% to 60% more expense than ground-mounts, when it comes to their racking and installation cost. That is because more steel is needed and work is performed at height.

Working at height and removing the extra dust generated by farm vehicles adds 20% to 40% to agrivoltaic array operation and maintenance costs, versus ground-mounted sites.

The lower panel density means agrivoltaics require 10% to 40% more expense to generate electricity and an additional €20 to €50 payment per hectare is needed to cover the cost of mandatory statements by the farmer proving the continuation of agricultural production at such facilities.

Those expenses ensure agrivoltaic sites are, on average, around 40% more expensive than ground-mounted facilities.

At INTEC, we are keenly following the progress of agrivoltaic-related legislation in Italy and also monitoring the details of projects our customers have submitted in pursuit of PNRR incentives.

There is great enthusiasm about the potential of agrivoltaics for Italy, and the Russia-Ukraine conflict has emphasized not only the European Union’s dependence on Russian gas – triggering a general energy crisis – but also a reliance on certain foodstuffs sourced from Ukraine.

The two problems must be tackled hand in hand and agrivoltaics represent an ideal method of ensuring agriculture and energy production coexist without imbalance.

Getting the policy right is essential to ensuring the nascent agrivoltaic and agrisolar sectors do not become another missed opportunity, with practically-inaccessible incentives for farmers.

Detail

At the time of writing, we are still awaiting detail of the operating rules for agrivoltaic systems to be eligible for public incentives and PNRR cash. Developers need to know what design, construction, and monitoring requirements will apply and how the PNRR eligibility of such sites will be verified.

Regarding agrisolar, on farm buildings, a tender for such arrays was issued on July 21. Online applications must be submitted to the organization set up for the purpose by government renewables body the Gestore dei Servizi Energetici (GSE), with an application window due to have opened on Sep. 12 and set to close today.

The tender included an increase in PNRR financial aid of up to 80% for companies involved in, or set to switch to primary agriculture; the option of multiple farms sharing consumption of the solar power they generate and of combining as single agrivolatic-project applicants; and a raising of the maximum eligible rooftop array generation capacity to 1 MWp.

The procurement document also doubled the previous maximum PNRR-eligible expenditure, up to €100,000 for accumulation systems, and to €30,000 for recharging devices, with a PNRR total per single project ceiling of €2.33 million.

About the author: Andrea Tedesco is country manager for Italy at INTEC Energy Solutions. He holds an MSc in electronics engineering and has solar industry experience as a senior project, technical, and area manager; sales and marketing director; and business unit manager. His expertise includes new-business and product development, project management, and building alliances and partnerships.

Researchers from the University of Lausanne and the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology tracked the solar uptake of 600 homeowners in Schaffhausen, a city in the German-speaking part of Switzerland, for four months in 2022. They found that the best way for governments to nudge homeowners into installing rooftop PV solar systems was greatly increased when the individual was guided by self-interest.

“There were two key takeaways,” one of the study’s co-authors, Maurus Pfalzgraf, told pv magazine, “and one was that nudging is effective.” The other major finding was that the success of nudging – meaning to gently propose an idea without a mandate or incentive – was determined by whether the homeowner was informed by how much money they could save, “or would have saved if they already installed PV,” Pfalzgraf said.

Mainly tasked with testing the efficacy of nudging, the researchers also wanted to find what personalized behavioral interventions worked better as a nudge. The first intervention was underpinned by prosocial motives – meaning the intention to benefit another person, group or society – and the latter intervention was rooted in self-interest. Schaffhausen was selected as the pilot city as its residential electricity price at the time of research was “very close” to the European average, the paper reported.

In collaboration with the local government, the researchers sent 600 homeowners two personalized letters. One of the letters addressed the prosocial benefits of rooftop solar PV and included phrases such as, “You could become less dependent on energy sources such as oil or gas from abroad and at the same time make a valuable contribution to climate protection.” The second letter was written in the vein of self-interest and included lines such as, “You are missing out on 7,900 kWh of solar electricity per year, worth around CHF 790 ($865).”

Both types of letters included invitations to receive PV consulting sessions offered by a neutral public organization. The consultation was followed by the option to request an offer for the installation. After the consultation, the homeowner was asked to state the likelihood for going through with the installation. At every step of the process, the researchers were keeping track of follow-through.

“With a 15-percentage point change, this self-interested type of nudge increased the pressure to act,” the paper states. “In comparison, a second group which received a personalized letter activating social norms regarding one’s community by demonstrating how many of one’s neighbors have already installed PV produced smaller, yet statistically significant effects with about 6.5 percentage point change.”

Pfalzgraf said the team was still waiting to collect the figures regarding how many individuals went through with the whole PV installation, and he was also personally interested in interrogating whether nudging worked to convince individuals with large property portfolios and renters. Overall, Pfalzgraf said the team was “happy” to see the “clear potential” of nudging proved as an effective government instrument. Nudging is generally perceived as an easier and cheaper mechanism for governments to employ as the prompts do not require policy-change or subsidies for implementation.

The research group presented its findings in the study “Governments can nudge household solar energy adoption: Evidence from a field experiment in Switzerland,” which was recently published in Energy Research & Social Science.

The research was conducted from June—September 2022 and was guided by a desire to “contribute to a better understanding of how public organizations can use behavioral interventions to promote renewables without large subsidies,” the paper claimed. Pfalzgraf said the research was important from a Swiss perspective as it could help the federal government achieve its net zero fossil fuel target by 2050.

Swissolar, the PV association of Switzerland, announced in June the central European country had installed more than 1 GW of PV last year – the third year PV demand increased by 40%. Switzerland recorded 4,134 MW of total solar PV capacity at the end of 2022, according to the most recently collected data by the International Renewable Energy Agency (IRENA).

From pv magazine USA

Honeywell and ESS are collaborating on advancing development of iron flow battery (IFB) energy storage systems based on ESS’ patented IFB design with Honeywell’s advanced materials and energy systems expertise.

The Honeywell Company dates back to 1885 with an invention that was a precursor to today’s thermostat. Fast forward many decades, acquisitions and spinoffs later, and one of the company’s many areas of expertise is in utility-scale battery energy storage systems. In 2021 the company developed flow battery technology intended for pairing with wind and solar resources and partnered with Duke Energy to field test the long-duration energy storage (LDES) product.

ESS, founded in 2011, manufactures iron flow batteries using widely available, Earth-abundant materials. Designed for applications that require up to twelve hours of flexible energy capacity, the batteries are used in utility-scale renewable energy installations, remote solar-plus-storage microgrids, solar load-shifting and peak shaving, as well as other ancillary grid services.

At a recent ceremony at RE+ 2023, the U.S. Department of Commerce awarded ESS an Export Achievement Certificate for expanding global deployment of its American-made, innovative long-duration energy storage technology. In response to domestic and global demand, the company announced that it will boost its manufacturing capacity at its Wilsonville, Oregon facility up to 2 GWh annually. 

“The demand for long-duration energy storage represents a compelling market opportunity within the energy transition and the combination of Honeywell and ESS technology can accelerate decarbonization for the commercial, industrial and utility sectors,” said Bryan Glover, chief growth officer, Honeywell Performance Materials and Technology (PMT) group. “Our strategic collaboration with ESS will accelerate Honeywell’s ability to bring comprehensive solutions to our customers while working to  advance long-duration energy storage across all industries requiring expansive energy storage.”

The collaboration between Honeywell and ESS enables Honeywell to integrate ESS technology into its global offering, and ESS gains license to Honeywell’s flow battery intellectual property. Additionally, the two plan to work together on continual technology advancement, cost reduction and packaging of IFB systems.

ESS battery systems have a prescribed design life of 25 years, the battery modules, electrolyte, plumbing, and other components may well last for decades longer with proper maintenance. The battery, for example, is expected to experience zero degradation over 20,000 cycles. Read more about its duration here.

Honeywell has invested $27.5 million into ESS common stock; purchasing 16.5 million shares at $1.67 per share. Honeywell also received a warrant to purchase an additional 10.6 million shares for $20 million at $1.89 per share. Honeywell also announced its intention to purchase up to $300 million of ESS products, with $15 million prepaid.

In addition to the investment, ESS receives exclusive license of Honeywell IP related to flow batteries

“Today, we are creating superior technology in the critical long-duration energy storage industry,” said  Eric Dresselhuys, CEO of ESS. “Combining ESS’ innovative technology and deployment experience with  Honeywell’s storage and control system expertise will enable us to drive the clean energy transition and  deliver value to our customers, shareholders and communities.”

Honeywell and ESS are teaming up at a time of huge growth in long-duration energy storage. According to the Department of Energy’s ‘Pathways to Commercial Liftoff: Long Duration Energy Storage’ report, the U.S. grid needs 225 to 460 GW of LDES capacity for power market application for a net zero economy by 2060.  The global LDES market is estimated to be $50 billion per year and forecast to grow significantly with a cumulative investment of up to $3 trillion by 2040, according to the LDES Council and McKinsey & Co.

As the shift to renewable energy accelerates, challenges associated with the intermittency of renewables are becoming more apparent. The solution is to embrace safe and sustainable long-duration energy storage technologies, which can address the intermittency of renewables by ensuring stored energy is available to balance fluctuations in electricity demand and supply.

“Long-duration energy storage is critical to meet local, regional and global net-zero decarbonization goals,” Julia Souder, chief executive officer of the Long Duration Energy Storage Council, told pv magazine USA. “LDES complements rapid renewable growth by offering flexibility, reliability, affordability and security. This partnership allows us to work together to accelerate the various markets and contracts even faster to deploy diverse LDES technologies.”

ESS held a webcast conference call on Monday, September 25, 2023 to discuss the partnership with Honeywell and it will be available on ESS’ Investor  Relations website.

Scientists from Sweden's Chalmers University of Technology sought to define optimal capacity expansion planning for off-grid PV mini-grids in rural Ethiopia and found that there may be serious issues in achieving cost-effectiveness and reliability at the same time.

“A significant number of the mini-grids deployed in off-grid areas of developing countries are experiencing serious reliability issues,” the academic explained in the paper “Long-term optimal capacity expansion planning for an operating off-grid PV mini-grid in rural Africa under different demand evolution scenarios,” which was recently published in Energy for Sustainable Development.

“At the root of the capacity shortage problem lies inaccurate initial demand assessments, and subsequent under-sizing of the mini-grids. Many mini-grids are designed using static and artificial load profiles, assuming that the present consumption levels of customers reflect their future energy needs.”

The researchers investigated the case study of a mini-grid operating in a small town called Omorate, located in southern Ethiopia. Costumers of this mini-grid in 2022 had a demand of 638.8 MWh, of which 250 MWh, or 40%, was unmet.

This system has a capacity of 375 kW and consists of a PV system, converters, maximum power point trackers (MPPTs), a storage system using five LiFePO4 battery packs with a total nominal storage capacity of 600 kWh, a diesel generator with 100 kW power, a distribution board and loads.

Using the HOMER Pro optimization software, they assumed three expansion scenarios for the mini-grid. In all scenarios, a maximum of 10% yearly shortage was allowed.

In the first scenario, the system expansion was conceived to meet the current demands – estimated to be on average 1750 kWh/day and 639 MWh/year. The second scenario assumed a 5 % annual demand growth rate, resulting in a daily and annual demand of 3,039 kWh and 1,109 MWh, respectively. The third scenario assumed a 15% annual demand growth rate for business and productive users only, summing up to daily and annual demand of 4,075 kWh and 1,487 MWh, respectively.

Through their analysis, the scientists found the third scenario had the lowest levelized cost of electricity (LCOE), of $0.404/kWh. The first scenario resulted in an LCOE of $0.887/kWh, and the second was $0.592/kWh. However, the average electricity price currently paid by households in the area was $0.030/kWh, meaning that the revenues generated from power sales may not be able to recover the cost of the expansion.

“The findings highlight two important points,” the paper says. “First, the financial viability of mini-grid capacity expansion heavily depends on the electricity prices. Second, ensuring the financial viability of off-grid mini-grids in Ethiopia requires designing the systems to support productive use of electricity and introducing appropriate incentive mechanisms and tariff restructuring.”

The researchers explained in the paper that the 15% expanding scenario will be the most expensive to complete, with a total cost of $7.4 million. The 5% expansion will cost $5.9 million, and the meet-the-demand scenario will cost $4.2 million.

Their findings also show that in all scenarios, the battery expansion accounts for most of the total capacity expansion costs, accounting for 52%, 62% and 73%, respectively.

“It is always recommended to use larger capacity batteries to meet a given electrical load. However, a larger battery also increases system costs, the researchers said. “Conversely, expanding the mini-grid solely based on cost minimization may not produce the desired reliability. This highlights the significant non-linear trade-off between minimizing capacity expansion costs and maximizing reliability levels.”

“Although not all, many of the findings of the study have a high degree of generalizability to the context in tropical east Africa and other developing regions at large,” the paper concluded.

Electra Power is pulling out of the PV market, it said in a recent statement to the Tel Aviv Stock Exchange. It also said it is in “advanced negotiations” to sell its PV activities for ILS 20 million ($5.25 million) to ILS 30 million.

Electra Power said that it would rather focus its activity on LPG, natural gas and other electricity sources.

According to the company's financial report for 2022, its PV operations were based on renting commercial rooftops and agricultural areas throughout Israel, constructing PV plants there, and selling them.

The company had an installed capacity of 4.7 MW and a project backlog of 25 MW in 2022.

“We haven't yet signed an agreement for the selling of our PV activity, and we can not assume whether our current negotiations will finalize,” the company said. “As per the assumed value of the deal, we are expected to report a loss of ILS 30 million to ILS 40 million in the third quarter of 2023 for our PV investment.”

EDF Renewables UK and Ireland, a unit of French energy giant EDF, has acquired UK solar installer SAS Energy.

The renewable energy company said the SAS Energy purchase will allow it to expand its in-house offerings to include financed and capital-funded projects across the solar, electric vehicle and battery storage sectors for commercial clients.

The acquisition follows a period of growth for SAS Energy, which specializes in C&I installations. Accounts filed with UK corporate register Companies House show that SAS Energy increased its workforce by 50% to 31 people in the year to Sept. 30, 2022. Inventory holdings increased from GBP 347,079 ($429,000) to GBP 1.76 million during the same period.

SAS Energy had more than 45 projects in development or construction at the time of the sale. EDF Renewables UK and Ireland plans to operate SAS Energy as a wholly owned subsidiary.

EDF Renewables UK and Ireland completed the acquisition on Sept. 15, marking the latest milestone in its ongoing collaboration with SAS Energy. Together, the companies worked on a rooftop PV installation at Safran's manufacturing site in Pitstone, United Kingdom. SAS Energy served as the main contractor for the project, which involved the installation of over 2,100 roof-mounted panels.

“We are looking forward to working with the SAS Energy team and EDF Business Solutions to expand our offering and reach a larger proportion of the UK Commercial and Industrial market; with enhanced delivery making onsite renewables projects more cost effective and accessible for our customers,” said Rachael Kyle, head of the C&I Renewables Team at EDF Renewables UK.

From pv magazine India

CRISIL, an S&P Global company, has entered into a definitive agreement to acquire Bridge To India Energy Pvt Ltd (Bridge To India), a renewable energy consulting firm.

Bridge To India offers its clients insights into the renewable energy market.

“Sustainability and climate change are drawing sharper attention from clients worldwide,” said CRISIL CEO Amish Mehta. “The acquisition of Bridge To India, with its positioning and expertise in the space, will strengthen our bouquet of offerings spanning sustainability services and decarbonization.”

Vinay Rustagi, the managing director of Bridge To India, said that the company has established its strong position in the Indian renewables sector through more than a decade of consulting experience, comprehensive research coverage, and a strong network.

“Being part of CRISIL will further enhance value to clients through adoption of global best practices,” said Rustagi.

The acquisition is subject to applicable regulatory approvals and other customary conditions, and is expected to close within the next three months.

From pv magazine Germany

Shell has put Sonnen up for sale, according to Handelsblatt. The German news outlet now values Sonnen – which Shell acquired for for €500 million ($536.8 million) four year ago – at €1.35 billion to €1.8 billion. The oil giant reportedly wants to sell off all of the German energy storage company, or at least 51% of it.

“In principle, Sonnen is continuing its global growth course in the rapidly expanding storage market,” said a company spokesperson.

Shell has also declined to comment on the matter.

Shell acquired charging infrastructure specialist Ubitricity and Next Kraftwerke in 2021., but now it seems to want to withdraw from the residential storage business. It recently sold its retail electricity and gas business in Germany and Great Britain to Octopus Energy.

Israeli solar developer Teralight has signed a contract to sell the full production capacity of its Ta'anach 2 project for ILS 2.2 billion (USD 578 million) to ILS 2.3 billion, it said in a recent statement to the Tel Aviv Stock Exchange. It will sell the electricity to Dalia Power Energies over a 23-year period, for use by Israeli households.

The Ta'anach 2 project is a solar-plus-storage project with a combined capacity of 108 MW/433 MWh. It is part of the wider Ta'anach project. The Ta'anach 2 project is expected to start operations in the first half of 2025.

Teralight said it will sell the energy to Dalia Power Energies under a tariff linked to the regulated production tariffs set by the country’s Electricity Authority. The contract between the two companies has also stipulated undisclosed minimum and maximum tariffs, above which they will share excess profits. Based on current tariffs, the companies have supplied the overall ILS 2.2 billion to ILS 2.3 billion.

The Ta’anach project is located in the Jezreel Valley, northern Israel. Its capacity of 250 MW is said to be 5.2% of Israel’s clean energy capacity and 1.2% of the country’s total production capacity. According to Teralight, the project will serve 63,000 Israeli households.

From pv magazine 07-08/23

European funds have been pledged to back two solar and energy storage solutions to help smallholders in Africa till tough terrain and get produce to market. London-based impact investor InfraCo Africa will spend $2 million to acquire 40% of Mobility for Africa, a Harare business which adapts Chinese-made electric tricycles to bring mobility to remote areas of eastern Zimbabwe, and United Kingdom government body Innovate UK is funding a GBP 270,000 ($336,000) pilot project which could transform farming in Malawi.

US-born Mobility for Africa boss Shantha Bloemen tells pv magazine the accelerated roll-out of her company’s Hamba tricycles could have a huge impact on communities, and particularly on women who take produce to market.

“Africa is still primarily a rural continent, something like 70%, on average,” says Bloemen, who co-founded Mobility for Africa four years ago in Harare, alongside the late Felicity Tawengwa. “There’s a huge deficit of roads – concrete, tarred roads – and also a deficit of transport, and that becomes more acute the further you go away from a road. The World Bank says something like 40% of the rural population live at least 2 km from a major road.

“Even if you have a really good harvest and grow lots of tomatoes, it’s going to be very difficult to get those to market. Women die in childbirth because they can’t get to a rural health clinic, children are not vaccinated for the same reason. Women spend three hours walking to get water, that’s time that could be used to grow more tomatoes.

E-transport

“It’s something anyone who has spent time in rural parts of the continent can see,” adds Bloemen. “We have a romanticized view of women balancing big baskets or a baby on their heads and we’ve come to accept that as normal.”

Electric transport could change the picture, says Bloemen, who grew up in Australia and retains the accent.

She says, “The exciting thing is, now we have the potential of electric transport and we can’t justify ignoring such a lack of facilities any more. Petrol is often imported; it’s expensive, and it relies on a big company to distribute so it’s rarely available in rural areas in practical quantities. When we were reliant on fossil fuels [for transport] it was left as something that was impossible to solve.”

The Mobility for Africa director and CEO says she came up with the idea of importing tricycles – christened Hambas, from the Ndebele word for “go” – to Zimbabwe after seeing them widely used in China, where she worked for UNICEF, formerly known as the United Nations International Children’s Emergency Fund.

The tricycles are manufactured by Ducar and went electric, powered by a lead-acid battery, eight years ago.

Mobility for Africa crowdfunded a container of 50 vehicles and deployed them with the help of students from China and Zimbabwe and two Ducar technicians. Assembling the Hambas locally, the company found the long charging times necessary meant lead-acid batteries were impractical. Although a consignment of off-the-shelf lithium-ion batteries brought further range, Bloemen says, “we could see they were more suited to [energy] storage than to transport.”

Bespoke batteries

Help arrived from former Tesla engineer Ruichen Zhao, whose Fourier Energy startup designed a bespoke 5 kW lithium phosphate battery which offers a 100 km-plus range under a 300 kg to 400 kg load. “It should last 8,000 to 10,000 cycles, which is something we’re testing – so that should be good for at least 40,000 km,” says Bloemen.

With the Hambas fit-for-purpose and modified to make them more comfortable for women to operate, Mobility for Africa needed an optimal deployment plan.

“We’ve been testing, for three years, a fleet management system for shared mobility,” says Bloemen. “Our model is based on introducing a fleet of tricycles designed for women, setting up a system of battery swapping, using off-grid energy, and you then use shared ownership models with groups of women renting the tricycles – now with, also, a lease-to-purchase model – on a monthly basis.

“We also have drivers servicing rural transport needs: transporting an elderly woman to a clinic, perhaps, or taking produce to market.”

Mobility for Africa tackles the recharging challenge by charging a fee to swap a battery. Additionally, it offers a “mobility-as-a-service” model, for groups to rent the tricycles on a monthly basis.

InfraCo cash

The $2 million equity investment from InfraCo Africa – which is funded by the governments of the Netherlands, Switzerland, and the UK – will turbocharge the number of Hambas and charging stations deployed by a company, which has locations at Harare and Domboshawa; a pilot site at Wedza, 140 km from Harare; and which set up a base, last year, at Chipinge, a mountainous dairy farming area 600 km from Harare.

With Mobility for Africa assembling four Hambas per day – Bloemen’s aim is to eventually have a factory in Zimbabwe. The company had a fleet of 200 vehicles at the time of writing and is due a further 200, spread evenly across its four sites, in August, and the same number again by March, to unlock the full InfraCo Africa investment. The intent is to fund 600 extra batteries, in addition to the Hambas, plus eight new solar-powered charging and battery swapping stations. Mobility for Africa’s [MFA] charging station at Wedza has 15 kW of rooftop solar generation capacity.

“MFA’s offering has the potential to deliver very high sustainable development impact, enabling increased trade in agricultural produce, creating employment, promoting economic growth, and easing movement in areas with difficult terrain,” an InfraCo spokesperson tells pv magazine.

Mobility for Africa is exploring how the charging stations and batteries which power the Hambas can offer electricity to rural communities, an aspect the project has in common with the AfTrak farming pilot scheme in regional neighbor Malawi.

Engineers from Loughborough University, in England, and US-based lead-acid industry body the Consortium for Battery Innovation (CBI) believe they have a sustainable method of providing the “deep bed farming” needed to cultivate the impermeable subsoil present in much of Malawi.

Project partner Tiyeni, a UK-based non-governmental organization, identified the increased agricultural yields available if small scale farmers could successfully till the “hard pan” ground that is around 300 mm below the topsoil in many areas of the African nation.

Loughborough University’s Jonathan Wilson and CBI representative and project manager Carl Telford came up with the idea of converting a hand-steered tractor unit to be powered by heavy, lead-acid truck batteries.

Eureka moment

“Jonathan Wilson and I went to Malawi with Innovate UK to learn about energy issues in the country,” says Telford. “We came up with the idea for the Aftrak.”

Taking its name from “Africa Tractor,” the AfTrak will feature four 12 V, 210 Ah batteries supplied by Swiss-owned manufacturer Clarios. Wilson tells pv magazine the AfTrak batteries will offer 6 kWh to 8 kWh of usable capacity.

The two tilling devices to be funded by the pilot program will be charged from a base station fitted with 3 kW of solar generation capacity which, Wilson says, will generate around 15 kWh to 18 kWh of clean power per day. Each AfTrak will also have a 200 W panel which will generate approximately 1 kWh daily, for top-up purposes. Clarios will donate the batteries for the first two AfTraks.

The modular base stations feature 1 kW solar capacities which can be stacked to meet local needs and can provide clean energy for communities and function as a microgrid if needed, Wilson adds.

Project manager Telford says the AfTrak could find much wider use, citing neighboring Zambia, which has similar farming issues.

“If it proves successful, there could be other agricultural challenges we could use the basic system for, perhaps by changing the shape of the tilling tool. The part that does the tilling is typically made of a hard material so we’re making them replaceable with steel, and potentially with locally fabricated materials.”

Lead-acid

The CBI representative explains why the Aftrak features lead-acid, rather than lithium-ion batteries.

“Lead-acid batteries have a very high recycling rate,” says Telford, “by teaming up with Varta [German battery maker Vertrieb, Aufladung, Reparatur transportabler Akkumulatoren], the recycling rates of lead-acid batteries are incredible. The main thing is they’re so robust, so stable, and so easy to use – they’re abuse-tolerant. In the environment where we’re using them, they’re a better choice. They are also a lot cheaper than lithium-ion batteries.”

Mobility for Africa Chief Executive Bloemen also has high hopes for the wider use of her company’s electric Hambas, beyond rural Zimbabwe.

“Kenya and Zambia have similar ideas about community farming and agricultural development,” she says. “I do think this is a new focus in Africa because small-scale farmers are the backbone of African food production. If we can make the right strategic partnerships, we can come in and provide the mobility solutions.” Mobility for Africa’s pitch to InfraCo Africa cited potential markets in Benin, Malawi, Mozambique, Nigeria, and Zambia.

The company has already supplied vehicles to local police and health services.

“We’ve tested our tricycles with rural healthcare facilities and now we’re asking whether we can try a pilot program at, say, 50 clinics, especially when they’re already installing solar for cold-chain purposes,” says Bloemen.

She says the InfraCo Africa funding is a transformational development.

“We have been managing on grants,” she tells pv magazine. “$1.5 million of Swiss money, another grant of Swedish money but they all need matching funds. We were in what the startup community calls the ‘valley of death’ – where a company has to transition from family and friends – and crowdfunding – to really scaling. Two million dollars is a small-ticket item for InfraCo Africa but, for us, we now have a year to prove this can be financially viable and have a real impact and then, hopefully, we can grow to where I can put a proper factory in place and expand internationally.”

Saudi Arabian energy giant ACWA Power announced the financial close for the 200 MW Kom Ombo project, a utility-scale solar power plant in Egypt. With an overall investment cost of US$182 million, the Kom Ombo plant is expected to be commercially operational in January 2024.

ACWA Power announced a Power Purchase Agreement (PPA) with the Government of Egypt in October 2018 to develop, finance, construct and operate the Kom Ombo project. The plant will be located less than 20 kilometres from Africa’s biggest solar park, the 1,465 MW Benban complex, also developed by ACWA Power.

A financial package of US$ 123 million for the project was previously announced in April 2023. The package comprised of loans of up to US$ 35.6 million from the EBRD, US$ 14.4 million from the OPEC Fund, US$ 14.4 million from the AfDB, US$ 34.1 million from the GCF, US$ 14.4 million from Arab Bank and US$ 10 million from the SEFA under the COVID-19 IPP relief programme. The project already has equity bridge loans of US$ 14 million from the EBRD and US$ 45 million from APICORP.

The International Renewable Energy Agency's (IRENA) latest statistics show that Egypt hit 1,724 MW of cumulative installed PV capacity at the end of 2022.

Solegreen said in a recent statement to the Tel Aviv Stock Exchange that it will start building nine solar-plus-storage projects with a combined capacity of 210 MW/470 MWh across different locations in Israel.

The Israeli Electricity Authority selected the projects in a 2020 tender. The facilities will sell power at ILS 0.1745/kWh to Israel Electric Corp. However, the company said it might also decide to sell some of the power at market rates.

Solegreen said it plans to complete the first projects, totaling 55 MW/120 MWh, by the end of this year. pv magazine has learned that five projects will be set up in the Gaza envelope region, one in the Arava region, and three in the northern part of Israel.

Solagreen has secured an ILS 900 million loan from a consortium of lenders led by Israel’s Leumi Bank and local insurer Menorah Group.

Engie has agreed to acquire US-based battery company Broad Reach Power from private equity funds EnCap and Apollo.

The French energy giant said that it has signed a binding agreement for the acquisition, but it did not disclose the purchase price. The deal includes 350 MW of operational assets and 880 MW of assets under construction, with commissioning expected by the end of 2024.

In addition, the deal involves 1.7 GW of advanced-stage projects and a substantial pipeline of early-stage projects, according to a statement from Engie. The projects are situated in Texas, California, and the central United States.

The transaction is now subject to approval from relevant antitrust and energy regulatory authorities. The finalization of the acquisition is anticipated to occur in the fourth quarter of this year.

In July, Engie and Paris-based Meridiam reached an agreement to purchase South African renewables developer BTE Renewables from UK investment firm Actis for an undisclosed sum.

From pv magazine 07-08/23

Renewables are increasingly the answer to Ukraine’s energy woes. Widespread blackouts last fall and winter triggered a solar boom in the country, as households and businesses struggled to find solar-charged batteries. The solar frenzy heralded humanitarian programs, primarily focused on keeping the lights on for the critical civil infrastructure: schools, hospitals, and kindergartens.

Solar, as the most easily deployed clean energy source, can support Ukraine in its hour of need, says Máté Heisz, director of global affairs at industry group SolarPower Europe. “Ukrainian people continue to live in fear and feel the daily effects of the attacks on their homes, hospitals, and schools,” he tells pv magazine.

SolarPower Europe, Bundesverband Solarwirtschaft (BSW), and its Ukrainian PV industry association peer launched the “Solar Supports Ukraine” campaign in December 2022 to support critical infrastructure in the wake of constant, prolonged outages.

SolarPower Europe member BayWa r.e. has made a generous donation to fund a solar project to meet all the power needs of Kharkiv Hospital No.17. The German developer is due to work with campaign implementation partner the RePower Ukraine Foundation, on the project.

“Energy Act for Ukraine Foundation and Menlo Electric will also jointly develop a solar and storage installation for the Bucha, Lyceum No. 3 school, one of the projects which we are fundraising for,” says Heisz. “The two organizations will equip up to 10 Ukrainian hospitals and schools with solar, with a total output of 300 kW.”

That solar system was financed by donations from BSW members including SMA, Qcells, BayWa r.e., and IBC Solar. “Despite the substantial amount we have received, we are still relentlessly pursuing more corporate donations,” says Heisz. “In particular, we are still missing about €40,000 ($43,600) for our next project, the Chernihiv Regional Hospital Project. With this money, our implementation partner, the Energy Act for Ukraine Foundation, would be able to construct a 73.6 kW hybrid solar system which will partially cover the hospital’s electricity supply and, critically, its surgery and intensive care units, where lifesaving work is being performed.”

Heisz highlights the recent destruction of the Nova Kakhovka dam and hydroelectric power station in Kherson which forced thousands to evacuate, and halted access to electricity. “That’s why we are still asking people to donate to our Solar Supports Ukraine campaign and to help keep the lights on in Ukraine,” he says.

Making a difference

Other solar aid initiatives also focus on critical infrastructure. “The last heating season, in the midst of a full-scale war, showed how important it is for hospitals and water utilities to have their own sources of electricity,” says Dmitro Sakhalyuk, technical expert of the Solar Aid for Ukraine initiative and for NGO Ecoclub.

As of June, the initiative was completing three solar plants for hospitals in Dubno, Zhytomyr, and Sumy. “We have developed design and estimate documents and will soon announce tenders for the construction of solar plants for water utilities in Zviahel, Zhytomyr region; and Brody, Lviv region,” says Sakhalyuk. “In addition, in Kremenchuk, where we plan to build a solar power plant for a hospital, we will soon develop design and estimate documentation. In less than a month, we will start constructing three more solar power plants.”

Ecoclub has received more than 200 requests for solar plants from Ukrainian municipalities and the number keeps growing. “We are looking for partners who will provide equipment, implement turnkey projects, or finance them,” Sakhalyuk says, adding the immediate target is to bring 118 kW of equipment from Europe with negotiations ongoing for twice that generation capacity.

Solar Aid for Ukraine aims to show renewables are affordable and to encourage communities to work towards energy independence. The government last year outlined ambitious clean power targets in its national recovery plan. Solar should play a vital role in a plan many say should be instituted immediately.

“Ukraine’s post-war sustainable recovery has already begun,” says Sakhalyuk. “So it is the best time for international partners to cooperate with Ukrainian municipalities and explore different models of financing clean energy projects.”

Pumping in cash is not the only solution, Sakhalyuk adds. “Municipalities in Ukraine need capacity-building assistance,” he says. “By working together with international partners, local officials and experts can learn from international experience, gain new skills, and enhance their knowledge in various areas including governance, urban planning, and economic development. Such cooperation will help Ukraine accelerate its recovery process.”

Olena Koltyk, head of the Ukraine Support Team (UST), tells pv magazine, “Ukraine definitely needs more solar aid as the country has great potential for it – especially in southeast regions which are severely suffering because of war – to make them resilient. Moreover, it has to be not only the donations of equipment but help with devising technical projects and installation, because communities do not have the capacity and expertise.”

UST works to equip hospitals, schools, and other critical infrastructure with hybrid solar. “Installation of solar is more reasonable in Mykolaiv than in Chernihiv region, due to better insolation,” says Koltyk. “In addition to hybrid solar plants, it makes sense to install solar collectors for hot water and heat supply. At the moment, we are looking for donors to finance these projects. Several projects on the installation of solar in hospitals and schools have already been implemented in Ukraine but this is extremely insufficient – there may be thousands of such projects.”

Taming chaos

International solar aid for Ukraine is chaotic, however. No one knows where solar panels and batteries are going so it is not clear how effective they will be, says Oleksiy Orzhel, chairman of the Ukrainian renewable energy association. Orzhel stresses, though, how grateful Ukrainians are for the aid.

The nation needs systematic aid for industry with Orzhel stating there is practically none. Guarantees to foreign investors are not being fulfilled, he says.

This “calls into question the future development of the market,” says Orzhel. “In this regard, there are ideas for foreign donors and investors to finance a fund that would provide a certain level of guaranteed payments for investors in renewable energy facilities. Such a tool would partially allow them to pay off loans, cover operating costs and costs of repair and restoration after emergency modes of the grid.”

Historic international programs to support industry have been halted by the war. A Ukraine Recovery Conference held in London in June discussed insuring such programs but it is premature to discuss action, says Orzhel.

Humanitarian aid from the EU and its member states to fund autonomous solar plants in areas where the grid has been disabled is seen as a temporary or medium-term solution. Such projects are combined installations enabling a hospital, school, or administrative building to have electricity, at least during daylight hours.

“At the moment, at the level of certain tasks and strategies, the possibility of investing in decentralized renewables generation is being considered,” says Orzhel. “At the same time, in connection with the constant military operations – and every day the Ukrainian energy industry is under fire – there is no investment in the energy sector.”

Supporting household solar is attractive since it brings visible results at a minimal cost. A rooftop solar panel installed at the hospital could save patient lives during outages every day. Helping with the development of the industrial sector is a more long-term strategy, requiring substantial funds and effort, but it could eventually become a game changer for the country’s energy security.

*Currency translation made on 21/08/23.

From pv magazine France

After five years of partnership, French energy company TotalEnergies has bought the remaining interest in independent power producer Total Eren, increasing its stake from nearly 30% to 100%.

TotalEnergies will not fully integrate Total Eren into its renewables business. The transaction follows a strategic agreement between the two companies in 2017, which allowed TotalEnergies to take full control of Total Eren after a period of five years.

According to figures provided by the two companies, Total Eren is valued at €3.8 billion. The acquisition of the 70.8% stake represents a net investment of around €1.5 billion. The integration of Total Eren is expected to result in an approximately €160 million increase in the net operating income of TotalEnergies' Integrated Power segment in 2024.

From pv magazine 07-08/23

With an electricity transmission crisis looming in South Africa, it appears that power generation project planners would be wise to conduct professional grid studies before spending big on development.

While South Africans are bracing themselves for up to 16 hours of daily blackouts in the current winter, the energy crisis in the country – largely caused by poor planning and mismanagement by the ruling ANC government – has reached a point where ministries are going it alone to secure reliable electricity. This knee-jerk reaction by government ministers could undermine already fragile transmission infrastructure and deepen the energy crisis further.

It is almost entirely a crisis of the government’s making and has led to a bizarre situation where cabinet is functioning as a de facto government against the regular legislature, against the background of an outdated Integrated Resource Plan (IRP) and a legally compliant Integrated Energy Plan.

Competing programs

South African president Cyril Ramaphosa in March gave Kgosientsho Ramokgopa responsibility for resolving the load shedding crisis in the newly appointed role of Minister in the Presidency for Electricity. The Ministry of Mineral Resources and Energy (MMRE), which stands accused of deepening the energy crisis, will remain under the leadership of Gwede Mantashe.

In office since 2019, Mantashe has overseen three procurement programs which have attempted to secure 9.7 GW of new power generation capacity, with 6.7 GW from solar and wind under two windows of the Renewable Energy Independent Power Producer Procurement Programme (REIPPPP). The first 430 MW of new solar and wind capacity is expected online late in the year.

Sluggish progress on realizing the additional capacity has been exacerbated by a lack of grid connection capacity offered by national utility Eskom. The power company said it had around 9 GW of spare capacity when the fifth bid window of the REIPPPP was announced, in April 2022. President Ramaphosa’s decision to raise the threshold for clean energy projects to require a license, from 1 MW to 100 MW, in August 2022, however, saw independent power producers swiftly gobble up that Eskom grid capacity.

The appointment of Ramokgopa supposedly saw him assume some of Mantashe’s responsibilities and the new minister has racked up the air miles meeting energy industry representatives, big electricity consumers, Eskom, and the cabinet. But the MMRE still has to sign off on power purchase agreements. Ramokgopa appears to have no office, no budget, and no plan.

Ramaphosa had also, in 2020, appointed a Presidential Climate Commission within the Ministry of the Presidency. The commission has recommended 50 GW to 60 GW of new renewable energy generation capacity plus 3 GW to 5 GW of peaking generation capacity to maintain supplies at periods of high demand, with the recommendations part of the IRP document which aims to estimate how to meet energy demand to 2030.

Energy procurement

Mantashe has announced a request for proposals for the supply of 5 GW of clean energy, which will be issued by his ministry this year as bid window 7 of the REIPPPP. The following bid window, aiming to procure another 5 GW of capacity, will open between December 2023 and February 2024. The minister said the two procurement rounds will be accompanied by attempts to commission a total 1.23 GW of battery storage projects, without stating what energy storage capacity such sites would have. Mantashe also plans a 3 GW gas-to-power procurement by the end of August and a 2.5 GW nuclear round between December and February.

Elsewhere across the cabinet, the forestry, fisheries, and environment minister, Barbara Creecy, has said the government is processing applications for approximately 2.9 GW of solar facilities and 6.89 GW of wind turbines, with associated battery storage, transmission, and distribution infrastructure.

The Transnet National Ports Authority has issued a request for proposals for a 20 MW solar plant plus battery storage at Richards Bay as part of a plan to roll-out around 100 MW of renewables across all the authority’s commercial seaports. Meanwhile, the Department of Water and Sanitation has launched an expression of interest to procure 19 power plants with an unspecified generation capacity, including floating solar.

The National Energy Regulator of South Africa (NERSA) in May approved Eskom’s bid to procure 100 MW of solar plus a 150 MW battery at the Komati Power Station in Mpumalanga; 75 MW of solar at Lethabo Power Station, in the Free State; and 19.5 MW of photovoltaics at Sere Wind Farm in the Western Cape.

Shovel-ready status

With government departments hatching their own clean energy plans – seemingly without reference to Mantashe’s REIPPPP strategy – Eskom and trade bodies the South African Photovoltaic Industry Association and the South African Wind Energy Association conducted a Renewable Energy Grid Survey to capture the state of the industry.

It found around 19.6 GW of solar-plus-battery capacity, 13.3 GW of photovoltaics, 21 GW of wind generation, and 7.5 GW of wind-plus-battery projects are at or near construction-ready status in the country.

Policy changes

To help address the energy crisis, Ebrahim Patel, minister of trade, industry, and competition, has suspended parts of the nation’s Competition Act to enable energy companies and consumers to resolve electricity supply constraints.

Minister Creecy is asking the public whether the development and expansion of solar and battery sites can sidestep usual environmental permitting requirements.

With more than 50 GW of solar and wind power expected, Segomoco Scheppers – MD of Eskom’s new transmission company – told electricity transmission providers the nation will need more than 1,500 km of new transmission lines annually for the next decade. That’s almost five times more than Eskom’s transmission unit is currently installing.

More than 122,600 megavolt-amps (MVA) of additional transformer capacity will be needed, Scheppers said, versus Eskom’s currently installed base of just over 160,000 MVA.

With only 19,060 MVA of transformer capacity added since 2013, Eskom Transmission Project General Manager Naresh Singh told the same gathering the utility’s procurement processes “have become bureaucratic, lethargic, non-value creating, and ineffective.”

Scheppers said that a new approach would see an engineer from Eskom Transmission or a site-owner complete front-end engineering design before engaging a single engineering, procurement, and construction services contractor to complete the job.

Eskom’s transmission company has yet to be fully unbundled from its parent, however. Regulator NERSA licensed the move in March and public enterprises minister Pravin Gordhan has said the new National Transmission Company South Africa (NTCSA) would be operational by November. The proposed unbundling would leave NTCSA dependent on Eskom for its funding, however, because creditors want reassurance. Financial news service Bloomberg has reported fears an inability to raise cash from other sources will hamper the NTCSA’s effectiveness.

Government bailout

The government in April announced a taxpayer bailout for Eskom which will see the Treasury hand over ZAR 78 billion ($4.16 billion) in the current financial year – which ends on Feb. 29, 2024; ZAR 66 billion in 2024/25; and ZAR 40 billion in 2025/26 before assuming up to ZAR 70 billion of Eskom’s loan commitments in the latter year. The utility’s debt has risen to ZAR 439 billion and the taxpayer will have contributed almost ZAR 495 billion to the power company by 2026, under the planned bailout.

The Treasury appointed an international consortium of energy companies to review all of Eskom’s coal plants and advise on actions to restore them to their original production specifications.

To rub salt into the wounds of South Africa’s energy crisis, vandalism and cable theft caused 23 major electricity substation outages in Mandela Bay in May. A month earlier, electricity pylons in Tshwane were destroyed in acts of alleged vandalism.

About the author: Bryan Groenendaal started out installing rooftop solar systems 12 years ago, in Johannesburg, South Africa. He then progressed to larger industrial and commercial solar projects and then specialized as a utility scale solar project developer. Groenendaal has experience working in no less than eight countries in Southeast Africa. Groenendaal notes that South Africa’s president has increased the threshold of systems without a license required to wheel electricity via the grid, to 100 MW, in August 2021. “This opened the solar PV market to a flood of projects in both the private and public sectors, which allows municipalities to procure new generation capacity from IPPs [independent power producers],” says Groenendaal. “However, the transmission infrastructure is limited to how much renewable energy it can manage.”

Solar Tech, a subsidiary of Israeli developer Teralight, plans to build 314 MW of new solar projects across Israel, according to a recent statement to the Tel Aviv Stock Exchange.

The projects are separated into two groups of sub-installations. The first 164 MW group of solar fences and aquaculture PV projects will be installed in undisclosed locations across Israel. Under this agreement, the Israeli bank will provide a credit limit of ILS 510 million (USD 137 million).

From pv magazine India

The QIA, the sovereign wealth fund of Qatar, has bought a 2.7% stake in Adani Green Energy Ltd (AGEL), the renewable energy unit of Indian conglomerate Adani Group, through its subsidiary, INQ Holding LLC.

INQ Holding LLC bought 42,604,601 shares of Adani Green Energy at a price of INR 920 per share from Infinite Trade and Investment, a promoter entity of Adani Group, for a total amount of INR 39.2 billion.

Infinite Trade and Investment sold 44.9 million shares in a block deal, reducing its equity in Adani Green Energy from 3.37% earlier to 0.5%.

Adani Group recently agreed to develop 15 GW of renewables over the next few years in India.

Adani Solar, the PV unit of Adani Group, recently became India’s sole producer of large-sized monocrystalline silicon ingots for M10 and G12 wafers. Adani Solar is a part of Adani New Industries Ltd. (ANIL), which is trying to develop the world’s largest green hydrogen ecosystem

From pv magazine Spain

Spanish energy company Cox Energy has finalized the acquisition of Spain-based renewable energy developer Abengoa.

From pv magazine Spain

Researchers at Argentina's National Scientific and Technical Research Council (CONICET) have developed a comprehensive pricing framework for photovoltaic assets that reportedly shows how different real options embedded in a PV project interact with each other and how they affect the optimal timing and value of investment strategies.

“Our new methodology allows accommodating different sources of uncertainties with different stochastic features as well as accounting for the various managerial flexibilities embedded in most solar projects,” the research's corresponding author, Bruno Mombello, told pv magazine. “As uncertainty resolves and decisions proceed, often new options open to managers such as expanding capacity, relocating facilities, or disinvesting. Successive decisions can be assimilated into a portfolio of sequential, mutually coupled options. Our work advances on the current practice of valuing standalone options, as flexibilities are jointly priced as a compound multi-stage option portfolio which is optimally exercised.”

In the paper “Valuing photovoltaic power plants by compound real options,” published in Renewable Energy, Mombello and his colleagues explained that investments in photovoltaic assets should be made by pricing the projects as interacting multi-stage compound options, and not as standalone options.

“Renewable energy projects are being subjected to increasing uncertainties,” Mombello said. “Power price fluctuations, policy changes, subsidies withdrawals, emerging transmission congestions, and development of PV costs may have a deep impact on the economic profitability of renewable investments. The high energy and solar price volatilities experienced in recent years due to pandemics, war, and geopolitical conflicts are fresh and tangible examples of the substantial risks that renewable projects are facing.”

A compound option is usually defined as an option to receive another option as the underlying security. Simply speaking, it is an option on an option. The scientists said that the combinations of classical options, such as deferring, expanding, and relocating the plant, are jointly priced as sequential compound and mutually exclusive options. “Both relocation and mutually exclusive options have been previously overlooked when pricing PV projects,” they specified.

The proposed methodology is based on the least-squares Monte Carlo (LSM) simulation approach, which is used to assess unpredictable outcomes influenced by random variables, by reducing complex processes to a set of basic events and interactions.

The LSM algorithm used by the research team combines dynamic programming, stochastic simulation, and linear regression to estimate the continuation value, which is the present value of all cash flows that will occur before the terminal year of an asset's expected lifetime. “The continuation function cannot be estimated by excluding out-of-the-money paths in compound options pricing,” the group specified.

The academics evaluated different option portfolios and found that the value of a PV project increases with the number of options included in the PV investment portfolio. “Option portfolios with the same options but different exercising order have different values,” they stated. “An option written on another one that modifies the underlying asset affects both backward and forward options. This changes their optimal exercise time.”

The researchers explained that, currently, PV project developers and investors price only the deferral option, which they said may lead to a significant undervaluation of solar investments. “The consideration of compound options and their implications can enhance the understanding of the actual worth of flexibility to manage uncertainty,” they concluded.

In 2019, the same research group developed a methodology for assessing the value of PV in uncertain markets. The researchers say their tool may bring to fruition projects exposed to risks related to competition, fuel and electricity price volatility, technological advances, environmental issues, and unstable regulatory regimes, among other problems.

From pv magazine USA

Enphase, a US-based supplier of solar microinverters, delivered lower-than-expected revenues for the second quarter of 2022. It also offered significantly lower-than-expected guidance for revenues next quarter, posting an expectation of $550 million to $600 million, dramatically lower than the consensus forecast of $748 million. Following the earnings report, share prices dipped about 10%.

The California-based manufacturer has hit some choppy waters in the macro environment, as rising interest rates and stabilizing electricity prices have lowered demand for residential solar in the United States. While the company has posted strong sequential growth in Europe, slowing US sales are expected to persist into next year, pulling down revenues.

US residential solar is further being hampered by policy changes, particularly around reductions in compensation for net energy metering. California notably entered NEM 3.0 in April, and other states have followed suit.

ROTH Capital Partners Managing Director Phil Shen warned in an industry note that in addition to slowed demand, the emergence of Tesla as a residential string inverter provider may pose risk to Enphase’s market share. While Shen notes that Enphase is a superior product with a better value for total cost of ownership, customers and installers alike may be more attracted to a lower cash ticket price for the string inverters provided by Tesla. ROTH estimates that 20% to 30% of US residential solar market share may go to Tesla.

Enphase posted second-quarter revenues of $711 million, falling short of the consensus $722 million. It delivered 2.1 GW (DC) of microinverters and 82 MWh of energy storage. Earnings per share reached $1.47, coming in above the consensus of $1.25. ROTH lowered its 12-month price target from $250 to $185 and maintained its buy rating. The stock stands at $150 per share at time of writing.

The company also authorized a $1 billion stock repurchase program, a common tactic for businesses that may be looking to stem a declining share price and believe their company is undervalued in the market.

As demand for US-made components has increased under the regulatory environment created by the Inflation Reduction Act, Enphase has begun making contract manufacturing partnerships. Contract manufacturer Flex is producing IQ8 microinverters in Columbia, South Carolina.

It recently was visited by President Joe Biden to commemorate the launch of the site. It also began a new contract manufacturing operation with Foxconn in Mount Pleasant, Wisconsin. The two facilities shipped about 50,000 microinverters in the second quarter. Enphase said it is on track to begin shipments from a third contract manufacturer in the third quarter of 2023.

Enphase's US manufacturing footprint will total $60 million in capital investment, create 1,800 direct jobs, and produce 18 million microinverters per year.

With the global focus on renewable energy intensifying, governments around the world are implementing policies to reduce carbon emissions and combat climate change.

The energy crisis in Europe sparked by Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and the resulting demand for energy security has strengthened the continent’s focus on solar power and the EU has responded with a Solar Strategy which includes a plan to establish a home-grown supply chain for solar manufacturing in the bloc.

The IRA was launched in August last year and the EU response was only announced seven months later, in February, since when the latter has slowly moved towards implementation.

While the IRA primarily utilizes tax incentives as its main instrument, the EU's approach, known as the Net-Zero Industry Act, focuses on several areas including easier regulation, faster access to financial support, and fair and open trade. Upon closer examination, however, it becomes evident that the EU's plan lacks specificity on how its grand objectives will be achieved. The act sets ambitious targets and goals but fails to outline clear and simplified regulation or immediate incentives for manufacturers.

What is needed?

To establish a European solar supply chain, EU policymakers must prioritize the development of simple and easily accessible instruments that provide tangible advantages for manufacturers based in the EU. The current policy instruments suggested, such as better access to public government tenders, will not be sufficient to attract manufacturers to the region.

Clear financial incentives, decoupled from restrictive conditions, could be a significant motivator for manufacturers to stay, or settle in the EU. These incentives could include tax incentives, low-interest loans, grants, equity instruments, subsidized land purchases, and infrastructure commitments.

The recent announcement of Swiss module manufacturer Meyer Burger’s decision to build its new cell factory in Colorado, rather than in the German state of Saxony-Anhalt, is proof that the IRA is more attractive than the EU’s approach – Meyer Burger openly admits that the $1.4 billion tax incentives on offer in the US were a key decision maker.

Show me the money!

In addition to creating effective policy instruments, EU legislators must ensure that sufficient funds are available to implement their initiatives. The current lack of clarity in the financing of the renewable energy plan creates uncertainty and hinders market confidence. It is imperative that the EU engages in transparent discussions regarding the financing of its renewable energy goals, to provide a stable and predictable investment environment. This will instill confidence among manufacturers and help attract the necessary funding for the establishment of a robust European solar supply chain.

Solar hotspots

Determining the hottest markets for solar in Europe over the next five years requires the consideration of various factors, such as political support, solar capacity targets, and electric demand. Germany, with its revived solar capacity targets, is expected to remain highly attractive for solar investments.

Countries such as the Netherlands, France, and Poland are also demonstrating strong political backing for renewable energy. In terms of added capacity and favorable electric demand, Spain and Italy are likely to be the next most prominent solar markets in Europe.

Despite the positive outlook for solar energy in Europe, the industry faces several challenges that must be addressed. Firstly, project developers often demand exorbitant prices for project rights, leading to unprofitable projects due to increased finance costs and, high equipment prices. This misalignment between project expectations and market realities impedes the implementation of solar projects.

Staff shortages

Furthermore, the industry faces a shortage of qualified staff along the entire value chain. This scarcity of talent hampers market growth as companies struggle to meet the demands of expanding markets.

Additionally, some companies that experienced rapid growth during the solar boom may face downsizing or failure if planned projects and revenues do not materialize as expected. Even if the future of solar looks bright, these challenges still need to be overcome. The EU and member state governments could do more to help tackle these challenges.

The recently revised migration laws in Germany might be a good signal for foreign talent to join the ever growing renewable energy industry.

EU vs IRA

The EU's renewable energy policy response, particularly its focus on establishing a European solar manufacturing supply chain, falls short when compared to the IRA.

The bloc needs to move faster and demonstrate greater ambition to establish a strong and competitive European supply chain for solar manufacturing. The European Commission, parliament and Council of Ministers must finally get going, instead of just talking.

About the author: Martin Baart co-founded Berlin-based emerging-market commercial and industrial solar finance company Ecoligo in 2015. The company has channelled more than €37 million ($40.9 million) of retail investor capital into markets including Kenya, Ghana, Costa Rica, Chile, Thailand, the Phillipines and Vietnam. He is a qualified electronics technician with a BEE from Trier University of Applied Science, MBE from Steinbeis University in Berlin, and a GEMBA from IE business school in Madrid. Martin is a board member of Amsterdam-based B2B solar and energy storage provider Solnet Group.