Currently ranked next-to-last in solar installations, the 140-MW Lookout project could grow PV in South Dakota from 1 MW to 141 MW and provide employment in the country’s poorest county.

In the final part of our interview, Dan Shugar, goes into detail about a subject NEXTracker has studied in depth — static and dynamic evaluation of wind impacts on single-axis trackers. We include video of trackers (and a bridge) caught galloping in the wind.

While trackers for solar panels might seem a bit mundane, once you stumble into CEO Dan Shugar’s reality distortion field, trackers become kind of sexy.

Tesla shipped a record number of electric vehicles in the most recent quarter and started production at its new China factory. However, 2019 was not “the year of the solar roof,” despite Elon Musk’s aspirations. Your humble narrator tracked down some solar roof installations to witness Tesla’s solar glass in the wild. We’ve got pictures.

Venture capital is still flowing to energy storage startups and the march to improve a wide variety of battery chemistries continues.

How will solar startups innovate in the 2020s? Where are the disruptive PV technologies?

Alta Devices has not located a white-knight investor to save the company and resume its PV cell production. That means no health care or COBRA for its furloughed employees.

Barry Cinnamon, a Silicon Valley solar installer, details the transition to energy storage, profiles early solar adopters and notes the challenges of getting to 200-amp residential service.

“I kind of compliment PG&E because they’re our best marketing department when it comes to battery storage,” says Barry Cinnamon of Cinnamon Energy Systems in the first part of our interview.

Tesla finishes the year on a high note amid a flurry of year-end EV funding, news and optimism on longer-range electrics.