Germany

SolarEdge was able to keep its streak of profitable quarters going — in what was expected to be a hard-hit quarter for solar. The company sees “signs of recovery in the U.S.”

Tesla boss Elon Musk has published the first image of the planned Gigafactory in Grünheide, near Berlin, in eastern Germany.

The EU-funded Nextbase project aims to manufacture heterojunction, interdigitated back-contact solar modules for less than €0.275/W. Solar panels featuring the Nextbase cell tech are expected to have a conversion efficiency of 23.2%, according to the European Commission.

This investment comes on top of the $100 million invested in 2018. Venture capital and corporate funding of new energy technologies continues despite — or perhaps because of — the pandemic.

Direct-air capture, along with its mythic sisters, clean coal and carbon capture and sequestration, is a process where CO2 from fossil generators and industrial sources is captured, treated and injected into underground earth formations for permanent storage or for industrial use.

Sinn Power of Gauting, Germany combines wave, wind and solar power for the “first floating ocean hybrid platform.”

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.

Trina Solar has been manufacturing its 500 W modules for a month now and plans to increase module output to more than 600 W in the future.

Also in the brief: Montana high school students raise money for a solar installation, Pacific Gas & Electric is tapping into two Li-ion battery storage projects, a startup from Germany has developed a solar-powered UV disinfection station and more.

German industrial giants Uniper and Siemens are working together to advance the use of green hydrogen and replace conventional, gas-fired hydrogen production plants.