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Solar Records

India Sees Highest-Ever Quarterly Solar Addition

by Saurabh Mahapatra April 30, 2018

India witnessed its highest-ever solar power capacity addition in a quarter during the first three months of this year, government data shows.

India managed to add 4.6 gigawatts of new utility-scale solar power capacity between January and March 2018. The previous highest solar power capacity addition in a quarter was seen exactly one year back in Q1 2017 with the addition of 3.3 gigawatts.

The high solar power capacity addition was a direct result of the busy auction schedule India has seen at the central as well as the state levels in the last few quarters. As India continues to auction gigawatts of new solar capacity every month, this record could easily be surpassed in the coming quarters.

Slowdown in Renewable Energy

While the solar sector added its largest volume ever in Q1 2018, the overall renewable energy capacity added took a hit. Year-on-year, the renewable energy capacity addition in India dropped nearly 14%, from 7.2 gigawatts to 6.2 gigawatts.

The major reason for this decline is the sharp fall in wind energy capacity addition. Around 3.6 gigawatts of wind capacity was added in Q1 2017, which fell to just 1.2 gigawatts in Q1 2018. Quarter-on-quarter capacity addition was, however, encouraging. In Q4 2017 just 2.7 gigawatts of renewable energy capacity was added.

Notable capacity addition in the biopower sector helped shore up the total renewable energy capacity addition in Q1 2018. With around 7.5 gigawatts wind energy capacity auctioned in India so far, wind could be expected to have a larger contribution in the coming quarters.

Revival in Coal

The coal-based power sector witnessed a major revival, with the largest capacity being added in the last eight quarters. Around 4.2 gigawatts of coal-based power capacity was added in Q1 2018, up from 3.2 gigawatts in Q1 2017.

The coal-based power sector also broke the trend of capacity retirements in Q2 and Q3 2017. Interestingly, the net coal-based power capacity added in 2017 was around 4 gigawatts only. The average coal-based capacity addition in India between Q2 2016 and Q4 2017 was just 1.1 gigawatts.

India witnessed an addition of 12.2 gigawatts of coal-based capacity in Q1 2016 and saw a steep fall since then, up to Q1 2018. Capacity addition by private companies in the coal sector have taken a hit over the last few quarters due to subdued demand and alarming debt situation.

April 30, 2018 0 comment

CSP Solar Records

SolarReserves Bids 6.3 Cents Per KWH In Chile For Dispatchable 24-Hour Solar

by Guest Author March 14, 2017

written by Guest Author

Originally published on CleanTechnica.
By Susan Kraemer

In Chile’s last auction for power, SolarReserve bid a world-record-breaking low price at just 6.3 cents per kWh ($63/MWh) for dispatchable 24-hour solar.

SolarReserve’s CSP technology with integrated thermal storage provides 24-hour solar power, and is ideally suited for Chile’s grid with round-the-clock power needs due to its huge mining industry. To bid 24-hour solar at 6.3 cents per kWh is a world record for CSP (Concentrated Solar Power), a form of solar utilizing heat from the sun that can be stored thermally. Chile has open auctions for both fossil energy and renewables, and no subsidies.

CleanTechnica spoke today with SolarReserve CEO Kevin Smith about the firm’s next Chilean bids:

SK: You bid Crescent Dunes in Nevada at 13.5 cents, then Redstone in South Africa at 12 cents. Your bid in Chile was 6.3 cents. How are you able to come down so low for solar that includes thermal storage so it can be dispatched any time — 24-hour solar for just 6.3 cents/kWh?

KS: SolarReserve has made substantial advances in our technology that has increased efficiencies and brought down capital costs since our first project in Nevada.

But there are a number of other factors that influence power prices and the Chilean market appears to be ideally suited for solar thermal with storage. In addition to the best solar resource in the world, the country’s stable financial status along with US dollar denominated power contracts results in excellent financing and investment terms

Interestingly, our thermal solar bids were lower than all but one new-build natural gas project bid into the last tender. Chile has no indigenous fuels, so natural gas needs to be imported in the form of LNG, which is much more expensive than natural gas costs in the US, and is susceptible to spikes in supply pricing in the world markets.

SK: How do you ensure that you can deliver solar power around the clock? Does that require operating at something less than full capacity? [Background explainer: How CSP works: CSP with integrated thermal storage makes solar dispatchable at any hour 24 hours a day.]

KS: Our bulk storage capabilities utilizing molten salt give us tremendous flexibility, without having to consider the degradation issues associated with batteries or the replacement cost issues.

We’re designing the projects in Chile for full capacity 24 hours a day. To do that we put in about 14 hours of storage. That will give us the full capacity of the project essentially 24 hours a day.

We could design it for three times the power for 8 hours a day or twice the output for 12 hours a day, but since Chile’s load is really a 24-hour load we design the storage to handle that.

It really comes down to the design of the steam cycle and turbine capacity, the storage tank capacity, and the size of the heliostat field, which dictates how much additional power you can store when its sunny.

SK: You seem to do all the permitting before you bid, not just in South Africa which requires it, but even in the US and Chile that do not — why? [SolarReserve just received the environmental permitting for its 450 MW Tamarugal CSP; the second of three thermal solar projects it is developing in Chile. Copiapó was permitted in 2015. A new CSP project, Likana is in development.]

KS: I think we’re a bit out front in the way we operate. We like to move forward on permits and make sure we have a fully developed project that’s ready to go. That provides confidence to the offtaker, that the project will be built on the time frame expected in the bid.

For SolarReserve, obtaining the permits certainly minimizes the development risks of the project. So the fact that we’ve got two of our main projects fully permitted we think is an advantage to us, certainly for a risk standpoint for SolarReserve.

SK: Yes, I’d think that must also help the offtaker, by making it more likely that new generation it contracts for really will happen.

KS: Right. I believe in the last round some of the winning bids didn’t have fully permitted sites and I think they’re still selecting sites. We actually think the Chilean government should take the development risks of the selected projects more into account — how developed a project is — because that will impact the ability of the developer to get the project done. We think it should come into play in their analysis.

[South Africa’s success in speeding renewables growth was because the REIPPPP limited bidders to those with fully permitted projects and likely financing. By contrast, the US allowed a disorganized rush to simultaneous permitting, financing and contract negotiation, so that many of the big California solar projects listed by the Department of the Interior failed to materialize, while “using up” places in the interconnection queue.]

SK: Chile has open auctions with competing bidding from both renewable and legacy generation. So why is coal not winning any bids?

KS: There are two blocks of power that the government was asking for: the majority was for 24-hours per day supply, and then there was a block that was allocated for daytime only supply only, which is more geared towards PV.

New coal just isn’t competitive with renewable energy any more in addition to the pollution issues related to coal. Some of the utilities do have existing generation from coal that isn’t fully contracted and we expect some of those projects will continue to be bid into the tenders.

It’s highly unlikely that new coal projects will be built in Chile. New coal projects have been turned down for permitting, so to bid a coal project that isn’t permitted yet and assume that “well I’ll get it permitted” would be a high-risk strategy.

Our view is that our advanced storage technology is suited for 24-hours a day generation as opposed to wind and PV which aren’t. PV with battery storage can supply short term storage or ramping capabilities, but isn’t a good fit for true bulk energy storage, due to the degradation and replacement cost issues associated with batteries. We think Chile’s 24-hour block a good fit for us, so we’re going to bid what we believe is the right way for the system to operate – which is adding true capacity into the market.

SK: Did any other renewables bid into the 24-hours block?

KS: It was interesting and surprising that one of the winning bids in the last round for the 24-hour block was a wind project developer that bid wind plus “spot” electricity supply. Their strategy is to operate their wind project for its expected capacity, say a 30 capacity factor when the wind blows, and then when they can’t supply from their wind facility, they would purchase excess power from the grid in order to meet their contract obligations.

Our view is that that is very difficult to manage and finance, and for the most part, that doesn’t really help the Chilean power system. Chile needs real 24-hour a day power, and are not looking for companies that are in some sense just putting together a financial bid that really takes flexibility out of the grid.

While this might be a reasonable short term strategy since there is modest additional capacity in the system, on a medium or long term basis it could result in substantial power price spikes during low supply periods. It’s interesting that the bid requirements, as structured, didn’t actual have real capacity requirements in order to bid 24-hour blocks of energy.

Take that strategy to the next step: if everybody did that, there would be limited new power projects built in the near term. Spot prices rices would quickly rise and they would have shortages on the market.

SK: Might you bid a Hybrid PV/CSP like Copiapó in Chile’s Next Round?

KS: We permitted Copiapó for PV as well as CSP, but actually in the current situation, we’re not sure of the value of adding PV into the mix, because daytime power prices are low. We can take the PV out as we’re not required to include it. We could always come in later and add the PV in the future if it makes economic sense, but we think it has limited value in the Chilean sector right now: there has been an oversupply during the day because of all the PV.

The spot prices when PV is available are coming down and so it’s less valuable, and some of the merchant projects that were built are not performing very well because of these lower power prices.

So in the last round we bid Copiapó purely as CSP with SolarReserve’s tower and molten salt storage technology. We had already made that decision that the PV wasn’t adding any value to the bid, so we did not include the PV, and we bid that at $63/MWh. [Ed: 6.3 cents per kWh]

Images: SolarReserve and Wikimedia

Reprinted with permission.

March 14, 2017 0 comment

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Solar Power Now Least Expensive Source Of Electricity In 58 Emerging Economies

by Steve Hanley March 5, 2017

written by Steve Hanley

Solar power is now the least expensive source of electricity on average in 58 emerging economies around the world, according to Bloomberg New Energy Finance. Why is that important? Many of those countries are part of the developing world, places where, until recently, people have been living in conditions barely more advanced than feudal times.

Energy is what allows human beings to perform deeds that exceed what is possible by using muscle power alone. It builds cities, establishes transportation networks, and creates wealth. Until the advent of the internet, billions of people were blissfully unaware of the modern world. No more. Now that those people know what is possible, they want to share in the blessings of an advanced society — now, not generations in the future.

China is the perfect example. After World War II, it awoke from its own feudal dream and aspired to join the world’s leading nations. To make that happen, it built hundreds of coal-fired electrical generating facilities. Today, the US has less than a dozen cities with more than one million inhabitants. China has 106 and is building more every day.

India is anxious to replicate China’s success. Until recently, it sought to build its own vast network of coal-fired plants. When Western leaders admonished India that the world’s environment could not absorb more carbon emissions, India retorted that the western nations had built their economies on electricity made from coal and it was hypocritical to deny India the same opportunity. That was a hard argument to counter.

But now China is cutting coal and India is saying it is going full-solar ahead with its climate action plans (despite Trump) because it just makes sense (see: India Commits To Continued Climate & Cleantech Leadership In Spite Of Trump — Exclusive Video).

March 5, 2017 0 comment

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US Solar Grows 95% In 2016 In Record-Breaking Year

by Joshua S Hill February 19, 2017

written by Joshua S Hill

Originally published on CleanTechnica
by Joshua S Hill

The United States solar market had its biggest year to date in 2016, growing a phenomenal 95%, installing a fantastic 14.5 gigawatts of new solar capacity, according to new statistics released today.

The latest US Solar Market Insight report from GTM Research and the Solar Energy Industries Association (SEIA) was published today, revealing that 2016 blew all expectations away. 2015 itself had been a record-breaking year, with the US solar market installing 7.5 gigawatts (GW) of new solar capacity. But 2016 almost doubled that total, growing 95% in one year to install a total of 14,625 megawatts (MW), and becoming the leading source of new electric generating capacity installed through the year, with 39% of new capacity across all fields.

“What these numbers tell you is that the solar industry is a force to be reckoned with,” said Abigail Ross Hopper, SEIA’s president and CEO. “Solar’s economically-winning hand is generating strong growth across all market segments nationwide, leading to more than 260,000 Americans now employed in solar.”

In fact, it was a great year for US renewables, with solar accounting for 39% of all new electric generating capacity during the year, and wind accounting for 26%.

“In a banner year for US solar, a record 22 states each added more than 100 megawatts,” added Cory Honeyman, GTM Research’s associate director of US solar research. “While U.S. solar grew across all segments, what stands out is the double digit gigawatt boom in utility-scale solar, primarily due to solar’s cost competitiveness with natural gas alternatives.”

Utility-scale solar led the way in 2016, while non-residential exceeded expectations, thanks to two major segments — community solar recorded a record of more than 200 MW, while rate design and net energy metering “fueled a rush in project development and installation growth across a number of major state markets, most notably in California.”

Overall this should come as no surprise, given just how impressive the third quarter was for US solar. The SEIA published figures back in December which showed that not only did the third quarter see a total of 4.1 GW installed, but that the fourth quarter was expected to be even higher. At the time, GTM Research predicted that 4.8 GW would be brought online in the fourth quarter.

February 19, 2017 0 comment

Solar Records

Las Vegas To Use 100% Renewable Energy

by Steve Hanley December 22, 2016

written by Steve Hanley

Las Vegas, Nevada, is now the largest US city government to derive 100% of its electricity from clean, renewable energy sources. Okay, you’re right. That doesn’t include all those glitzy casinos with their bazillions of lights. What it does include is the entire city government and infrastructure from city hall to streetlights. “We can brag that the city, this city of Las Vegas, is one of the few cities in the entire world that can boast using all of its power from a green source,” says Las Vegas Mayor Carolyn Goodman.

Las Vegas 100% renewable energy

Getting there hasn’t been easy. In fact, Las Vegas began working toward the goal of using nothing but clean energy more than 10 years ago. The final step happened when Boulder Solar 1 — a 100 megawatt solar array in the southeast corner of Nevada — went online earlier this month. The solar project was developed and built by Southern Power, which owns the facility. The electricity generated by Boulder Solar 1 is distributed by NV Energy. Las Vegas also gets electricity from several geothermal facilities and smaller solar panel installations throughout the city.

The city’s green power push has reduced its energy consumption by 30% and now saves it the equivalent of $5 million annually thanks to lower utility costs. City officials expect their experience will help other cities convert to clean renewable energy. San Francisco, San Jose, and Grand Rapids, Michigan are just some of the other US cities who have made a commitment to using 100% renewable energy by the year 2025.

Faced with an incoming administration that is aggressively hostile to the Paris climate accords and taking any steps to responsibly address the threat of climate change, cities around the nation are taking matters into their own hands to lower their carbon footprint and find new ways to utilize renewable energy.

December 22, 2016 0 comment

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SEIA Identifies Top 10 Users Of Commercial Solar

by Steve Hanley November 28, 2016

written by Steve Hanley

When it comes to US business choosing to power their stores and factories with solar energy, the critical factor is money. Commercial solar prices have fallen by 58% since 2012 and by 16% year over year in 2016. In many cases, it’s just cheaper to install commercial solar power systems than continue to buy electricity from the local utility. Large US corporations now benefit from more than 1,000 megawatts of installed solar power. That’s up from 300 megawatts in 2012.

In its latest annual report entitled Solar Means Business, the Solar Energy Industries Association of America puts the spotlight on the 10 largest users of commercial solar energy. About half of them are retail store chains. Another quarter are distribution centers and data centers.

Target leads the way with 147 megawatts of installed solar from 300 installations. Walmart is right behind with 145 megawatts from 464 solar systems. Target is on pace to install another 70 megawatts of solar power in 2016 while Walmart has 21 megawatts of new solar power planned for this year. The full list of corporations in the top 10 is:

1. Target — 147 megawatts
2. Walmart — 145 megawatts
3. Prologis — 108 megawatts
4. Apple — 94 megawatts
5. Costco — 51 megawatts
6. Kohl’s — with 50 megawatts
7. IKEA — 44 megawatts
8. Macy’s — 39 megawatts
9. General Growth Properties — 30 megawatts
10. Hartz Mountain — 23 megawatts
10. Bed, Bath and Beyond — 23 megawatts

IKEA has installed solar systems at almost 90% of its 38 US locations, by far winning in relative terms. General Motors uses solar at 31% of its facilities and Johnson & Johnson is third in the percentage of its sites with solar power at 28%.

November 28, 2016 0 comment

New Technology PV Solar Records Solar Research

Swiss Engineers Claim New Solar Cell Efficiency Record (with Video)

by Steve Hanley September 11, 2016

written by Steve Hanley

Remember what happened with computer chips in the 80s? It seemed then like they got faster and cheaper every week. Breakthroughs were reported with dizzying regularity. Something similar is happening with solar cells and panels.

new solar cell efficiency record

September 11, 2016 1 comment

Solar Records

Latest Energy Auction In Chile Sees Price Of Solar Fall Below 3 Cents Per Kilowatt-Hour

by Steve Hanley August 23, 2016

written by Steve Hanley

Spanish solar energy company Solarpack Corp Technologica has just submitted the lowest bid ever to supply electricity to customers in Chile — 2.91 cents per kilowatt-hour. That price is even lower than the 2.99 cents per kilowatt-hour recently recorded at an energy auction in Dubai. The average retail price of electricity in the US is 12 cents per kilowatt-hour.

Solar farm in Chile

August 23, 2016 0 comment

Solar Records

Solar Energy Will Have A Very Good Year In 2016 Says SEIA

by Steve Hanley June 12, 2016

written by Steve Hanley

Solar energy accounted for 64% of all new electric generating capacity brought online in the first quarter of 2016 according to GTM Research and the Solar Energy Industries Association’s U.S. Solar Market Insight Report. In total, 1,665 megawatts of solar power were added between January 1 and March 31. The report also says that this year the solar industry will install an unprecedented 14.5 gigawatts of capacity. That’s a 94% increase over 2015. There are now more than a million operating solar PV installations across the country, representing 27.5 cumulative gigawatts of operating capacity.

Solar power installations GTM Research

June 12, 2016 0 comment

Solar Records

New Solar Cell Efficiency Record Breaks 21% Barrier

by Tina Casey November 9, 2015

written by Tina Casey

A new solar cell efficiency record has been set by China’s Trina Solar Limited, which announced that its new p-type multi-crystalline silicon solar cell has achieved a solar conversion efficiency of 21.25 percent according to the results of third-party testing. Greater efficiency does not necessarily translate into lower costs, but the manufacturing method is based on Trina’s existing technology and the company anticipates that its new solar cell will provide an extra push to the steep downward trend for the cost of solar-sourced electricity.

Somewhat ironically, the news of additional progress in the solar energy field caps off a series of extremely bad news for fossil fuels — particularly petroleum — beginning with the incredible Volkswagen diesel emissions scandal on up to denial of a permit for the Keystone XL tar sands oil pipeline in the US, and the exposure of ExxonMobil’s duplicity on climate change.

Solar Cell Efficiency Records

Where were we? Oh right, the new solar cell efficiency record. For those of you new to the topic, while complex multi-layer solar cells can already achieve solar conversion efficiencies far greater than 21 percent, relatively low cost and simplicity still provides silicon solar cells with an edge in the marketplace.

Trina Solar had its solar cell efficiency rated by the Fraunhofer ISE in Germany, which just a few days ago issued a report on the current state of solar technology and markets. Here’s what Fraunhofer had to say about solar cell efficiency records for technologies on the market today:

The record lab cell efficiency is 25.6 % for mono-crystalline and 20.8 % for multi-crystalline silicon wafer-based technology.

The highest lab efficiency in thin film technology is 21.0 % for CdTe and 20.5 % for CIGS solar cells.

In the last 10 years, the efficiency of average commercial wafer-based silicon modules increased from about 12 % to 16 %. At the same time, CdTe module efficiency increased from 9 % to 13 %.

In the laboratory, best performing modules are based on mono- crystalline silicon with about 23 % efficiency. Record efficiencies demonstrate the potential for further efficiency increases at the production level.

In the laboratory, high concentration multi-junction solar cells achieve an efficiency of up to 46.0 % today. With concentrator technology, module efficiencies of up to 38.9 % have been reached.

Did you catch that first item where it said the record for multi-crystalline solar cells was *only* 21 percent? Fortunately, the researchers who put together the report prefaced the whole thing by noting that in the fast-paced world of solar cell efficiency development, their information would probably be out of date sooner rather than later.

And, they were right.

The Trina Solar Cell Efficiency Record

That mark of 20.8 percent was probably rounded up from Trina’s earlier record-setting entry for solar cell efficiency, which clocked in at 20.76 percent about one year ago.

If you’re thinking that the difference between 20.76 and 21.25 doesn’t sound all that impressive, consider that even just breaking the 20 percent barrier has been a long, hard slog. Solar cell efficiency for multi-crystalline silicon technology was still hovering around the 19.8 percent mark back in 1999. As described in the solar cell efficiency study we came across, the researchers zeroed in on a “honeycomb” surface, echoing Trina’s Honey Plus brand:

The improved multicrystalline cell performance results [partly] from isotropic etching to form a hexagonally-symmetric “honeycomb” surface texture. This texture, largely of inverted hemispheres, reduces reflection loss and improves absorption of infrared light by effectively acting as a randomizer.

In its solar cell efficiency announcement, Trina notes that it purposefully focused on low-cost, scalable processes to manufacture the record breaking solar cell, leading to high-volume commercial production. Here’s the rundown:

The record-breaking p-type multi-crystalline silicon solar cell was fabricated on a high-quality mc-Si substrate with a process that integrates advanced Honey Plus technologies including back surface passivation and local back surface field. The 156×156 mm2 solar cell reached a total-area efficiency of 21.25%.

Solar Cell Efficiency Up, ExxonMobil Down

Getting back to that bad week for petroleum, ExxonMobil is dealing with a barrage of criticism for knowing all about the global risks and impacts of its products, yet choosing to sit on the facts while supporting a mini-industry of lies about climate science. As of this writing the company is also under investigation by New York State Attorney General Eric Schneiderman, so there’s that.

In a 2008 article, New York Times reporter Jad Mouawad provides a fascinating glimpse into the corporate culture behind the global warming denial strategy. Do read the whole thing but here’s a snippet including a remark by ExxonMobil CEO Rex Tillerson:

What might be called the Exxon Way can be summed up in three ideals: discipline, patience and long-term vision. It is a formula the company drills into its managers from the moment they join Exxon, and which it keeps repeating through their careers. It explains the company’s resilience and its view that it has survived, and thrived, through countless commodity cycles.

“We are all homegrown,” Mr. Tillerson says. “That happens through a very deliberate and very closely managed process, and it starts the day the person walks through the door with us. And we are the product of that system…

TAKE a room full of oil managers, and the Exxon people usually stand out, even as they try not to draw much attention to themselves. They typically band together, and often cultivate an aura of secrecy — and sometimes superiority — toward the outside world.