Netherlands

Also starting up: Dutch two-seat solar EV for ride sharing, and French company Supersola releases a plug-and-play solar module.

Developers say the design approach can prevent soil deterioration and still offer the same yield as south-oriented PV plants.

Also starting up: Space Force awards $50k to flesh out an idea for a solar-thermal spacecraft, and Lightyear finds a manufacturer for its solar EV.

Yotta Energy just won seed funding to install batteries under solar modules — in an architecture analogous to microinverters and optimizers.

Despite the pandemic, residential solar growth continues. Commercial solar, always the problem child, is having trouble coping with the virus.

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.”

Despite strong revenue growth in the U.S., the racking company is abandoning its U.S. manufacturing (and rhetoric) to “create a globally diversified supply chain.” Quick Mount was acquired by Netherlands-based Esdec last year in a roll-up of U.S. racking companies.

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.

Batteries have won the lion’s share of recent cleantech venture capital — but here are some recent funding rounds for fusion, graphene, electrical panels, circuit breakers, geothermal drilling and direct-air capture of CO2.

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.