Recent ArticlesBankrupt California utility Pacific Gas & Electric has come under fire on many fronts for the scope and execution of its self-imposed blackouts last month. The blackouts will continue as the company pursues a decade-long grid-hardening project. Electric utilities bear the solemn mission of keeping the lights on, but PG&E's intentional shutoffs leave customers to fend for themselves. That divergence from standard operating procedure poses a question for the embattled utility: How wil...
Longi Solar, JinkoSolar and REC Group appear to have emerged victorious from a legal attempt to shut the manufacturers out of the U.S. market. In a complaint filed in March, Hanwha Q Cells alleged that all three companies were infringing on a patent filed in 2008 by importing cells and modules that used proprietary technology. The case is now stayed, with a judgment of non-infringement expected within the next two weeks, according to a late Tuesday filing from the U.S. International Tra...
Smart inverters are going to play a major role in how utilities manage rooftop solar's effect on the edges of their grids. They could also be a key interconnection point for behind-the-meter batteries, smart thermostats and appliances, plug-in electric vehicles, and other distributed energy resources. On Tuesday, home energy management provider EnergyHub and inverter maker SMA announced a new step in making this kind of cross-DER aggregation a reality. It will start with an Arizona Public...
There is no doubt that bifacial modules are ready for their breakout role in the world of solar photovoltaic projects. By the dawn of 2020, there will be a cumulative 5.4 gigawatts of bifacial solar capacity installed globally, mostly in Asia, according to Wood Mackenzie Power & Renewables' first report focused on this market. In five years, there will be a nearly equal share of deployment divided among Asia and North America, with cumulative installed capacity growing tenfold, accordin...
PARIS — Shell expects its filling stations to eventually become fossil-fuel-free. But getting there will require major changes, and in the energy business, change often means subsidies. So it is with hydrogen, says Mark Gainsborough, executive vice president at Shell who heads up the company's New Energies unit. In addition to the power sector, Shell New Energies is responsible for the company's activities in new fuels, such as hydrogen and biofuels. The company is growing its network...
