Morning Brief: a massive battery ready to break ground, Vectren looks to cut net metering
Also in the brief: expanding a community solar pilot in San Antonio and how to guarantee a just energy transition for indigenous communities.
500 W-plus panel race intensifies with JA Solar’s new module and Risen’s first shipment
Chinese manufacturer JA Solar has announced a new 525 W+ panel and said the product will be available from the second half. Domestic rival Risen has shipped the first batch of its high-powered modules and intends to stick to pre-Covid-19 plans to ramp up production.
Lithium-ion storage is here to stay with no ‘post Li-ion’ era in sight
A German-Israeli research group has gathered to discuss which storage technologies may outperform lithium-ion batteries in the future. They concluded that there is no such a thing as a “post Li‐ion” era in sight. They recommended a “side‐by‐side” approach for multiple technologies in different applications, as well as the hybridization of technologies.
Distributed storage could save Texas $344 million per year by deferring transmission and distribution costs
Adding enough distributed storage to reduce peak demand by 20% could defer up to one-fifth of the transmission and distribution expenditures in Texas for about 10 years, a study found. Other states may find the study’s analytical insights to be useful.
The financial and social struggles of getting large solar projects financed
The pre-life of the Spotsylvania solar energy project has been riddled with financial and societal difficulties. As much as these issues have made a quagmire of development, it also provides a case study on the logistics of getting such a large project built.
Vivint beats on revenue — but losses widen in Q1 as residential solar hunkers down
Vivint beat estimates with $91.2 million in revenue in Q1, though, like with most other third-party solar companies, that was outweighed by $51.9 million in losses from operations. Installation figures fell during the quarter and are only expected to fall further, as Covid-19 runs its course on residential solar.
Morning Brief: Financing for a 200 MW project, EDP agrees to a power contract
Also in the brief: solar on schools in Virginia and a Hawaiian microgrid.
1 MW battery system meets the challenge of supplying power to a remote Alaskan community
Cordova, Alaska, a small fishing community in a remote part of Prince William Sound, has been able to find long periods of fossil fuel independence thanks to a new battery system developed by Saft.
Solar canopies can put PV panels in some new and interesting places
A major advantage of this design is the ability to string cables over a longer distance without the support needed in traditional racking approaches.
SolarEdge reports record revenue, yet Covid looms over residential PV for the next two quarters
Even though the U.S. market is showing some signs of stabilizing, the decline in installation rates in April alone was 33%.
