Lắp đặt điện mặt trời | Khải Minh Tech: tháng 9 2020

Thứ Tư, 30 tháng 9, 2020

Fort Bragg adds a floating solar + storage plant via Duke Energy, Ameresco

The U.S. Army’s Fort Bragg in North Carolina will soon be home to the largest floating solar plant in the Southeast – a 1.1-MW system as part of a Utility Energy Service Contract (UESC) awarded to Duke Energy. The $36 million contract will focus on energy resilience and security at Fort Bragg: infrastructure modernization including lighting and water upgrades, heating, ventilation and air-conditioning and boiler system improvements.

Ameresco, Duke Energy’s prime contractor, will build the 1.1-MW floating solar PV system on the Big Muddy Lake located at Camp Mackall. Fort Bragg will own and operate the system once construction is completed. Construction is expected to begin in November.

“We approached Duke Energy with the idea of a floating solar array unsure of how they would respond to the innovative concept,” said Audrey Oxendine, Fort Bragg Energy and Utilities Branch Chief. “However, Duke Energy was excited to take on the challenge and work with us to make an idea into reality.”

The floating solar installation will be paired with a 2-MW battery energy storage system. The system will supplement power to Fort Bragg from the local grid and provide backup power during electric service outages.

Floating solar power could have a big future. The U.S. Department of Energy’s National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL) researchers estimate that installing floating solar photovoltaics on the more than 24,000 man-made U.S. reservoirs could generate about 10 percent of the nation’s annual electricity production. Currently, floating solar makes up only about 1-2 percent of the world’s solar capacity.

About 90 percent of the floating solar capacity in the world is in Asia. However, the technology can take advantage of water space that would otherwise go unused – like at Fort Bragg. (View and download video of a floating solar facility).

-- Solar Builder magazine

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SolarPower Summit 2020: Policy measures and open-source information key to PV sustainability

Rising volumes of solar capacity are to be welcomed but, as panelists at a session of today's SolarPower Europe event discussed, the technology must be kept ethical and responsible. That means industry working together; new, harmonized, mandatory and voluntary policy instruments; and a focus on quantifiable, life cycle-based investor criteria.

Industry body SolarPower Europe kicked off its virtual SolarPower Summit on Monday. Set to run until Friday, the event will address solar-related topics from the state of the industry to financing in a post-subsidy era, green hydrogen, the circular economy and agricultural PV.

With pv magazine’s UP initiative in mind, today’s midday session: Solar, sustainability and the circular economy, was of particular interest. It attracted an impressive panel of experts with differing perspectives. Susannah Wood, marketing director at U.K.-based integrated utility scale solar developer Solarcentury was joined by Nancy Gillis, CEO of the U.S. Green Electronics Council (GEC); Andreas Wade, global sustainability director at U.S. thin film panel maker First Solar; and Fulvia Raffaelli, head of the European Commission’s ‘DG GROW’ department for growth.

As Wood stated in her opening remarks, while the growth of solar is great, its deployment brings a host of ethical questions related to matters including land use and solar array impacts. While looking at CO₂ savings is easy, she said, calculating the impact of construction and hardware installation is trickier. Wood said Solarcentury is midway through the process and working on a three-pronged approach which encompasses defining the scope of emissions then measuring and, finally, reducing them. It has taken the consultancy time, she said, to map its business model against greenhouse gas measurement standards.

Transparent, trusted, open-source

Wood said it is crucial for the industry to address the topic – a sentiment echoed by her fellow panelists – and to prepare for investor scrutiny. In that vein, Wood said it was vital all findings be transparent and made available on an open-source basis to enable the rapid growth of solar.

First Solar’s Wade mentioned the need to focus on life cycle approaches to optimize the performance of modules, inverters and balance-of-system equipment in solar plants, in addition to looking at the development and construction of projects – and issues like land management and biodiversity – through a sustainability lens.

Gillis, from the GEC, underlined how vital it is for the solar industry to ensure it is acting sustainably all the way down to the hardware used. That will support institutional purchasers, banks, investors and the entire tech sector in moving towards a circular economy.

Industry cannot afford to let the environmental impact of PV modules and inverters eclipse the benefits of solar as it replaces fossil fuels, said Gillis. If circularity is not kept in focus, solar modules will become a “significant” part of the e-waste stream. For the past 18 months, the GEC has been working on devising life cycle-based criteria for modules and inverters. Next month, it will launch a new type-1 ecolabel which applies five different categories to modules and inverters (see slide below).

The label, said Gillis, will be independently verified and can be used in many markets. You can read an op-ed by Gillis which was published in the September issue of pv magazine.

Commenting on the GEC’s new electronic product environmental assessment tool (EPEAT) label, Wade said First Solar welcomes it and looks forward to becoming one of the first to obtain it and he emphasized the importance of having measurable and comparable metrics. “It is important to have a transparent approach,” he said – verified by an independent third party – so trust can be built.

In an increasingly commoditized market, added Wade, sustainability is one of the key ways manufacturers can differentiate products and add value.

Mixed policy instruments

The European Commission’s Raffaelli discussed the work done in the past three years by the EU’s Joint Research Centre (JRC) on applying sustainability-focused policy instruments to solar modules, inverters and systems on the European market. That study is coming to an end and four voluntary and mandatory policy instruments have been identified, said Raffaelli: eco design minimum requirements, energy labeling, ecolabel criteria and green public procurement rules.

Eco design criteria would be applied to modules and inverters, said Raffaelli, while an energy label could apply to installations. The next steps will include a workshop on mandatory eco design and energy labeling policy instruments, and work on potential standardization. The EU is also planning a stakeholder meeting to discuss how such approaches could be designed in the most “efficient and ambitious” way.

The GEC’s Gillis, who is also working with the Joint Research Centre, said it is critical to ensure the criteria studied are life cycle based and to push for innovation. That will not only provide a baseline for companies but will allow for growth. To that end, harmonization would be essential, said Gillis, to avoid gains being diffused through confusion over different label or certification types. All the panel members agreed with that sentiment.

First Solar’s Wade added, the eco design policy is one of the most effective instruments available and makes sense for modules and inverters. It further allows for differentiation in a crowded marketplace, he said. Meanwhile, energy labels will push the social aspect of informing consumers about their choices and pushing sustainability into a wider mindset.

While she welcomed the EU’s stance on sustainable policy instruments, Solarcentury’s Wood – coming at the issue from a developer perspective – was more reserved in her judgement. With equipment purchased mainly from China and the EU and to be used in projects in Latin America, China and Europe, developers are looking for an “easy life,” she said.

Circular manufacturing

Circular manufacturing is the focus of the pv magazine UP initiative’s current quarterly theme. We have looked at whether adopting circular approaches can create a competitive edge and reap financial and reputational rewards, in addition to investigating what is already being done in the solar industry. You can browse our coverage here.

Pressure also comes from the banks, another big stakeholder for Solarcentury, added the marketing director. “It will be interesting to see what they say,” said Wood, adding: “Hopefully they will welcome the changes as they have a lot to say in the products we use.”

Wood pointed out the correlation between sustainability and quality, and that over an installation’s lifetime, quality is an important financial factor in terms of both performance and warranty length. Despite that, Wood added, banks can often have such specific requirements, the list of suppliers which can oblige can be significantly narrowed.

The Solarcentury representative said she supported a minimum requirement and optional opportunities for innovation and differentiation between products. With many of the sustainability-focused academic reports published “dense and not supportive,” Wood said SolarPower Europe is playing a leading role in providing more useful information to the industry.

False dichotomy

The GEC’s Gillis dubbed the additional costs of added criteria – particularly on sustainability – a “false dichotomy” and said it was “disheartening” to hear people saying sustainable means more expensive, because sustainable criteria address externalities not factored into “regular” products, whose added costs are only considered further down the line.

If costs are looked at from a life cycle perspective and if products are sustainable and efficient, said Gillis, costs will fall. That is not only beneficial for the buyers, the GEC panel member pointed out, but also for “those who live on this single planet.”

The European Commission’s Raffaelli agreed the matter was important but emphasized the need to avoid having too many criteria. It is important to stick to the right indicators which can make a substantial change, she said, and then design measures around those, rather than trying to measure everything – a principle Gillis agreed with.

The Green Electronics Council chief executive added, banks and other investors consider criteria other than sustainability, and need to know the quantifiable benefits of their investments. As such, the GEC will establish a benefits calculator committee next year to provide such information.

Steps ahead

Wrapping up the session, the panelists were asked what they believed are the biggest sustainability challenges for the solar industry.

Raffaelli said setting the objectives and providing the right direction for investors, research and industry would be essential. “We need to set a clear direction and mobilize all relevant tools to help that,” she said.

Wood and Wade agreed that while a lot of work has been carried out at a product level – and they were confident work on making hardware more sustainable is on the right path – the broader impact of solar still has to be addressed. That includes land management and social considerations. “We need to take people with us,” said Wood.

Sustainable Capital Finance updated its PPA financing platform

Sustainable Capital Finance Inc., a solar financing firm, has announced the official launch of the SCF Suite 2.0, a heavily updated iteration of its flagship platform, the SCF Suite. The proprietary web-based platform helps solar integrators to price, submit, and transact projects in order to obtain PPA financing, and the SCF Suite retooling includes stuff like automated agreement population and e-signature features.

While the industry as a whole has faced several new challenges in recent months due to the COVID-19 pandemic, SCF has seen renewed interest in many areas of the C&I solar sector, with the comprehensive development tools included in the Suite helping to facilitate continued project development.

-- Solar Builder magazine

These Santa Barbara School District solar microgrids have a resilience model others should copy

In a big win for clean local energy and resilience in the Santa Barbara region, the Santa Barbara Unified School District (SBUSD) Board unanimously voted last week to proceed with Solar Microgrid projects throughout the District, along with additional standalone solar projects.

For the Santa Barbara Unified Solar Plus Energy Resiliency Project, the Clean Coalition, a nonprofit organization, and Sage Energy Consulting completed feasibility studies for Solar Microgrid and standalone solar installations at 18 SBUSD sites. This was followed by designing and executing a state-of-the-art request for proposals (RFP) process for a 28-year fixed-rate power purchase agreement (PPA) for solar at 14 sites, with full Solar Microgrids at 6 of those sites.

As the best value from numerous excellent proposals submitted, Engie Services U.S. provided the winning bid to design, build, own, and operate all the projects. The Solar Microgrids will feature solar and energy storage that can provide indefinite resilience to the most critical electric loads, which include refrigeration, communications, and emergency staging. The rest of the loads will be maintained for a significant percentage of the time as well. The solar will be deployed in the form of solar parking canopies, and the benefiting parking lots will be staged for future deployments of electric vehicle charging infrastructure (EVCI).

In addition to millions of dollars in guaranteed bill savings through the fixed-rate PPA, and additional market opportunities that might arise from dispatchable solar energy, the SBUSD will enjoy millions of dollars in value from resilience benefits, for free:

The Value of Resilience

The value-of-resilience for the Solar Microgrids was secured via a highly innovative specification in the RFP, based on the Clean Coalition’s value-of-resilience (VOR123) methodology. The methodology is based on tiering electric loads into three tiers, which will be managed via automated functionality built into the Solar Microgrids:

Tier 1: Mission-critical, life-sustaining loads that warrant 100% resilience — usually about 10% of a facility’s total load. At the SBUSD, Tier 1 loads are freezers and refrigerators. The RFP specifies that during an outage, these loads must be kept operational 100% of the time.

Tier 2: Priority loads that should be maintained as long as doing so does not threaten the ability to maintain Tier 1 loads — usually about 15% of the total load. At the SBUSD, these are Main Distribution Frame facilities for communications services and primary Multi-Purpose Room type facilities for emergency response. The RFP specifies that these loads must be kept online approximately 80% of the time during outages.

Tier 3: Discretionary loads that should be maintained only when doing so does not threaten Tier 1 and Tier 2 resilience — usually about 75% of the total load. At the SBUSD, these loads are anticipated to be kept online approximately 25% of the time during outages.

“This visionary initiative will result in a trifecta of economic, environmental, and resilience benefits to the District,” said SBUSD board president Laura Capps. “In addition, our schools with Solar Microgrids will have the ability to serve as places of refuge to the broader community, during grid outages of any duration. I am proud of the unanimous support that has been given to this effort across the District’s board, facilities staff, and former and current superintendents, as well as the support we’ve received from the community at large.”

The SBUSD is located in one of the most grid-vulnerable regions in California, the Goleta Load Pocket (GLP) — a 70-mile stretch of Southern California coastline from Point Conception to Lake Casitas, encompassing the cities of Goleta, Santa Barbara (including Montecito), and Carpinteria.

The area gets most of its power from just one set of transmission lines hung on the same transmission towers and routed through 40 miles of mountainous terrain that is highly prone to wildfires, mudslides, and earthquakes — making the GLP highly transmission-vulnerable.

“The District’s Solar Microgrids have been strategically spread throughout the Goleta Load Pocket to best serve the entire community during grid outages, including those resulting from high-impact disasters,” said Steve Vizzolini, SBUSD Director of Facilities & Modernization. “We will be positioned to support everything from emergency sheltering with food service to internet access and electronics charging stations.”

The District will now enter into contract negotiations with Engie, with contract approval expected in November and construction targeted for next summer.

-- Solar Builder magazine

The Peck Company awarded contract for 6.8-MW Maine solar project

The Peck Company Holdings, a commercial solar engineering, procurement and construction company, signed a contract for a 6.8-MW solar project in Maine from a long time customer. The $2.365 million contract for the project, located near Portland, Maine, is scheduled for completion in Q1 2021. Peck’s expansion into Maine has been a highlighted area for…

The post The Peck Company awarded contract for 6.8-MW Maine solar project appeared first on Solar Power World.

Groundswell, Renewable Energy Buyers Alliance partner to localize benefits of corporate solar power purchases

Groundswell and the Renewable Energy Buyers Alliance (REBA) are joining forces to accelerate an equitable clean energy future for all by leveraging corporate renewable energy purchases to deliver local community benefits alongside clean energy. Connecting these large corporate purchases to community-defined clean energy priorities through tools such as Request For Proposal (RFP) language and community…

The post Groundswell, Renewable Energy Buyers Alliance partner to localize benefits of corporate solar power purchases appeared first on Solar Power World.

South Korean solar sector contests ‘unconstitutional’ biomass incentives

Dozens of solar companies are claiming renewable energy certificates issued for “wood-burning” biomass technology are unconstitutional as most such facilities are fueled by wood pellets co-fired with coal in older power plants. A constitutional court decision is expected within two years.

Some 63 South Korean solar companies have filed a lawsuit at the country’s constitutional court alleging subsidies for biomass projects are unconstitutional.

The plaintiffs claim the majority of “wood-burning” biomass facilities are fueled with wood pellets co-fired with coal in older power plants and point out the country had to temporarily suspend operations at a quarter of its coal-fired power plants last year to combat air pollution.

“Data from the plant operators themselves show that biomass plants can emit even more air pollution per megawatt-hour than coal plants, yet the Korean government is increasingly dependent on bioenergy to meet our renewable energy goals, stunting the growth of vital zero-emissions technologies like solar power,” said Joojin Kim, MD of Seoul-based non-profit Solutions For Our Climate.

A decision on the case is expected within two years

The solar companies claim biomass projects received nearly 40% of the renewable energy certificates (RECs) issued by the South Korean government under its renewable portfolio standard (RPS) scheme between 2014 and 2018, more than any other renewable energy source. RECs can be sold to power companies unable to otherwise fulfill their renewable energy requirements, on a market basis.

Under the Korean RPS, solar generation capacity in South Korea grew from 1,024 MW in 2012 to 11,768 MW last year and around 90% of the solar capacity added from 2014-16 secured RECs. Between 2012 and last year, Korea’s biomass capacity rose from 100 MW to 1.5 GW. Biomass-powered electricity rose from 106,023 in 2012 to 6,490,437 MWh in 2018.

The renewable portfolio standard, introduced in 2012, requires utilities with at least 500 MW of power generation capacity to provide a percentage of their electricity from renewables – a definition which encompasses solar, wind, biomass, biogas, waste-to-energy, landfill gas, tidal, hydro and integrated gasification combined cycle technology.

With power companies currently required to source 7% of their electricity from clean energy, failure to meet the quota is penalized by 150% of the cost of the REC shortfall. The RECs issued to renewable energy producers in Korea carry different weights, depending on the technology used.

The world’s highest utility-scale solar plus storage project

Built in Gangba County, in Xigaze, Tibet, the 40 MW/193 MWh facility was deployed at more than 4,700m above sea level and is functioning as a demonstration project for the ancillary services the technology could offer the Tibetan grid.

Chinese PV manufacturer Jetion Solar has announced completion of what it called the world’s highest-altitude, large scale solar-plus-storage project.

Built in Gangba county, in Xigaze, Tibet, the 40 MW/193 MWh facility sits more than 4,700m above sea level and receives more than 3,200 hours of sunlight per year, according to Jetion.

The plant is owned by Chinese battery manufacturer Dynavolt Renewable Energy Technology, Jetion said, with Dynavolt supplying the lithium-ion phosphate battery for a project for which Jetion provided engineering, procurement and construction (EPC) services as well as the solar panels.

“Based on the characteristics of local electricity load and the particularity of the Tibet power grid, the project was designed as a full energy storage allocation project,” said Jetion. “The solar arrays will charge the storage during the day and the storage will fully power the grid during the night.”

The energy storage system, Jetion added, provides power to communities in Xigaze and also functions as a demonstration project for the role solar-plus-storage can play in offering services such as peak shaving, frequency modulation and renewable energy dispatch to the Tibetan grid.

“At the same time, this project will also make positive contributions to Xigaze’s industrial development, fiscal [performance] and taxation, labor employment and targeted poverty alleviation, and promote the development of Xigaze’s surrounding industries, such as agriculture and mining,” said the EPC.

No further technical or financial details of the project were disclosed in the statement issued by Jetion.

Electriq Power enhances its virtual power plant possibilities with Lilypad Energy addition

Electriq Power, a developer of home energy solutions, entered into a definitive agreement with Lilypad Energy, a provider of data analytics solutions for the energy industry focusing on battery energy storage applications. Lilypad Energy will enhance the performance capabilities of Electriq Power’s fleet of residential and small commercial battery systems that can be paired with or without solar. The entirety of Lilypad Energy’s software and branding rights are now Electriq’s.

This is the latest development in Electriq Power’s expanding operations, following an announcement in early September that the company had entered into a definitive agreement with Emergent Microgrid, a provider of turnkey microgrids. Plus, it has a new LFP-based battery system.

What’s Lilypad do?

Lilypad Energy’s software enables system optimization planning before battery systems are installed at commercial and residential sites. The software provides evaluation capabilities to assess revenue generation opportunities from interventional curtailment for demand response, ancillary services, and other forms of system balancing grid-services, the building blocks for Virtual Power Plants (VPPs).

These assessments also provide smaller installation companies an affordable platform to optimize their planning and proposals.

“It’s exciting to join Electriq Power, one of the few companies in a position to leverage distributed energy resources as true grid assets,” said Henry Meyer, who will join Electriq Power as the head of its newly formed Services Group. “We will focus on accelerating deployments of battery systems to deliver the highest value to the broader energy system.” Meyer has previously held roles at ADL Ventures, Navigant Consulting, and Enernoc.

For Electriq, Lilypad Energy will help accelerate deployments of battery systems and provide real-time grid services as the company continues to pursue value-added services for Virtual Power Plants.

-- Solar Builder magazine

Nationwide, Sol Systems acquire largest solar energy project in Louisiana

Helios Infrastructure, a joint venture between Nationwide and Sol Systems, announced its acquisition of the largest solar power project in Louisiana. The 50-megawatt system is located in West Baton Rouge Parish, and it is now owned and operated by Helios. This acquisition marks the largest single project investment for Helios to date. Entergy Louisiana is purchasing the energy produced by the project through a 20-year power purchase agreement.

The project brought more than 350 construction and installation jobs to the area and it will provide ongoing, positive benefits to the community – clean energy and approximately $6.4 million in tax revenue – over the next 30 years. The system is projected to offset the equivalent of nearly 19,000 passenger vehicles’ greenhouse gas emissions annually.

“This is a resilience story, and an indicator that clean energy will play a significant role in the recovery of the region and our nation,” said Jessica Robbins, Senior Director, Structured Finance for Sol Systems. “The impacts of the pandemic have put us to the test, and we have an even greater appreciation for partners like Nationwide and Entergy. Partnerships like these are essential to provide hope and to jumpstart the recovery of our communities and economy,” she added.

Sol Systems and Nationwide have financed over $700 million of U.S. solar projects since 2012. The partners created Helios in 2018 to own and operate an expanding portfolio of utility-scale assets that sell energy to utilities, municipal customers, and universities. Today, Helios owns and operates over 300 megawatts of commercial and utility-scale solar energy assets throughout the United States.

Entergy has built out a power generating portfolio among the cleanest in the nation. Entergy Louisiana has approximately 190 megawatts of renewable energy resources, including hydroelectric, biomass and waste heat recovery. In all, over the past two years more than 25% of the energy provided to Entergy Louisiana customers has come from carbon-free sources.

DEPCOM Power provided the engineering, construction and operations and maintenance services for the project.

-- Solar Builder magazine

ACCIONA Acquires Texas PV Project

Diode Ventures, a Black & Veatch company that develops global infrastructure projects, says ACCIONA, a global group that develops and manages sustainable infrastructure solutions, has acquired 100% of a 240 MW AC/315 MW DC photovoltaic (PV) project in development in Fort Bend County, Texas.

With the transaction, ACCIONA extends its footprint in U.S. solar generation as demand for renewable energy grows due to increasing efforts to decarbonize the electric sector. Solar and wind projects owned and operated by ACCIONA generate more than 1,000 MW of power in the U.S. and Canada – with more in development.

“With solar power continuing to surge in demand as a cleaner, greener provider of electricity, we’re pleased to see this ambitious project advance closer to becoming a reality,” says Brad Hardin, president of Diode Ventures. “This is another important step toward sustainability and lowering our carbon footprint in an evolving electric marketplace, and we’re proud to be part of it.”

With three wind power projects in Cameron County, Texas, the Fort Bend project represents ACCIONA’s fourth investment in the state – and its first solar PV project in Texas. When operational, Fort Bend will give the company more than 750 MW of renewable capacity in Texas. ACCIONA has committed to delivering 1,600 MW of new solar across the U.S. by 2023.

The project, expected to create about 300 jobs during the construction phase, will be within the territory of the Electric Reliability Council of Texas (ERCOT), a membership-based nonprofit corporation that manages electricity flow to more than 26 million Texas customers.

Diode Ventures, which offers clients reliable, turnkey asset-development solutions for large-scale infrastructure programs, has teamed with Enfinite Capital to develop the Fort Bend Solar project to a full notice to proceed (FNTP) state. As an investment and asset management firm, Enfinite Capital specializes in renewable energy, infrastructure and real estate assets.

Diode bought the Fort Bend Solar project from Lendlease in 2018.

Photo: Diode Ventures’ landing page

The post ACCIONA Acquires Texas PV Project appeared first on Solar Industry.

Solar dominates Germany’s first ‘innovative renewables’ tender

Only one of the 28 hybrid renewable energy plants allocated in the oversubscribed exercise did not feature solar, and PV took all the awards in the single-technology section of the procurement round.

From pv magazine Germany.

The results of Germany’s first tender for renewables projects featuring innovative technology were published today, along with those of an up-to-10 MW solar tender.

Federal network agency the Bundesnetzagentur said the 650 MW innovative clean energy tender attracted 133 bids for projects with a total generation capacity of 1,095 MW. Some 73 projects, with a cumulative 677 MW of capacity, were allocated.

The Bundesnetzagentur said 45 of the bids in the innovative technology tender were for PV-only projects with a total generation capacity of 283 MW. The remaining projects were hybrid facilities which had to include an element of either solar or wind power and only one of the 28 hybrid schemes selected did not feature PV. Hybrid plants supplied 394 MW of the 677 MW allocated.

The agency said the market premiums agreed with hybrid project developers – paid on top of positive spot market energy prices – ranged from €0.0194-0.0552/kWh for an average €0.0450/kWh. The solar-only premiums ranged from €0.0096-0.03/kWh.

The sub-10 MW solar tender attracted 163 bids for 675 MW of generation capacity, of which 75, with a total capacity of 258 MW, were selected. Half of the approved projects were in Bavaria and the final prices agreed for the solar electricity to be generated – paid as a flat rate with no spot market element – ranged from €0.0480-0.0539/kWh for an average €0.0522, in line with previous tender rounds this year, which generated average prices of €0.0501-0.0527/kWh.

Pine Gate Renewables readies 14 solar sites, just the start of 500 MW coming to Michigan

Pine Gate Renewables and Kayne Anderson Capital Advisors, L.P. announced their first wave of solar energy projects into Michigan. The companies have completed development for 14 new solar farms in eight counties which will be constructed as part of a larger initiative to bring more than 500 megawatts of renewable energy projects to the state through 20-year Power Purchase Agreements. The initial 14 solar farms are expected to go online in the fourth quarter of 2020 and will produce approximately 40 megawatts of clean energy.

The first 14 projects will inject $80 million of capital into the state and contribute $11 million in tax revenue. In addition to the projects Pine Gate and Kayne are building in 2020, several dozen more will be developed for construction over the next three years while working to ensure key policies are in place to advance Michigan’s clean energy goals.

“We’re excited to bring locally-generated renewable energy to the great state of Michigan,” said Pine Gate Renewables CEO Ben Catt. “These projects are significant as they mark the beginning of a sizable renewable energy footprint in Michigan and are an environmental win for communities across the state.”

“Becoming a leader in solar energy in Michigan has been an important focus of Kayne Anderson over the last several years,” said Jon Levinson, Co-Head of Renewables at Kayne Anderson Capital Advisors. “We are very pleased to have brought this initial wave of projects into construction with our partners at Pine Gate, and we are very excited about the continued build-out of our solar footprint in Michigan over the next several years.”

Construction of the solar farms is underway in Branch, Calhoun, Genesee, Hillsdale, Lenawee, Missaukee, Montcalm and Saginaw counties.

The initial 14 solar farms are expected to produce enough energy to power approximately 7,600 homes in the first year of operation.

Each solar farm will employ dozens of highly-skilled workers, and bring more than 250 jobs to the state to build and maintain the projects.

Pine Gate Renewables developed the Michigan projects with Birch Creek Development. Financing was provided by KeyBank, Barings and US Bank.

-- Solar Builder magazine

Palestine seeks consultants for 35 MW rooftop solar program

The Palestine Investment Fund wants to install solar systems with an average generation capacity of 70 kW on 400 public schools.

The Massader development arm of sovereign wealth fund the Palestine Investment Fund (PIF), has issued a request for expressions of interest (EoI) to seek consultants for a school rooftop PV program.

The PIF aims to deploy PV systems on around 400 public schools in batches of 40 schools each.

Consultants and engineering firms have until October 30 to submit proposals and can access the EoI call here.

Having announced the program in January 2018, the PIF kicked-off the tender three months later. The European Investment Bank in July last year loaned the program $18 million. Until now, the program has been reported as targeting 500 schools but the number 400 is mentioned in the tender document, without any explanation being offered for the reduction in scope.

The average installed generation capacity per school is expected to be 70 kW.

Palestine had just 43 MW of solar capacity at the end of last year, according to International Renewable Energy Agency figures.

Bangladeshi renewables regulator vows to supply skilled solar workforce

In the wake of recent reports highlighting a global lack of clean-energy skills training, the country's Sustainable and Renewable Energy Development Authority has said it will work with private companies to set up vocational courses.

With two international bodies releasing recent reports about the importance of renewables jobs to the energy transition and Covid-19 recovery, Bangladeshi clean energy regulator the Sustainable and Renewable Energy Development Authority (SREDA) wants to train a skilled rooftop solar workforce.

The regulator on Sunday issued a call to people who wish to gain PV installation skills, with the advent of net-metering in the nation having boosted the popularity of the technology.

The call for applicants is open to anyone who either holds a first degree in engineering or who holds a degree in any discipline and has had five years’ experience in the solar sector.

Skills shortage

With the annual renewable energy jobs report published this week by the International Renewable Energy Agency (IRENA) noting a global shortage of skilled clean energy workers, SREDA said training was just as important as supplying good quality solar components.

“The net-metering guideline has mandated using [good] quality solar equipment,” said the regulator, adding: “Unless there is [good] quality design, installation and inspection, [the] possibility is there not to get [the] expected output from solar [systems].”

The IRENA report ranked Bangladesh as the fifth largest provider of solar jobs, with a 137,000-strong workforce last year, most of them employed installing the 5.8 million, off-grid solar home systems added to date. “Although most Bangladeshi solar jobs are in sales, installation and maintenance, some 10,000 people are also employed in module assembly,” stated the report, quoting a pv magazine article.

Ezaz Al Qudrat A Mazid, founder and CEO of Dhaka-based consultancy Solar EPC Development Ltd, told pv magazine most of the country’s solar workers had not received formal PV-related training.

“Most of the workers who look after solar home systems are people like electricians, carpenters and aluminum fabricators and are not trained professionally,” said Mazid. “Our solar industry is not developed so far, apart from the installation of the solar home systems. Only eight IPP [larger, independent power producer] projects so far [have come] online, which could accommodate only a handful [of] skilled people.”

Opportunities

The chief executive said his company plans to offer scholarships, internships and full-time opportunities to installers as it bids to connect 200 MW of solar generation capacity within five years.

SREDA chairman Mohammad Alauddin echoed IRENA’s warning about a shortage of skilled workers. He told pv magazine: “In both front line and mid-level [positions] we have [a] huge shortage of skilled manpower,” and said the regulator planned to work with private sector bodies to arrange training programs.

Another recent employment-related report, written by European private-sector body RES4Africa, highlighted the benefits and pitfalls of the energy transition in regions which are dependent on fossil fuel industries.

Sizing standalone solar-plus-storage with nomograms

A Spanish-Dutch research group has created nomograms for PV system sizing that not only offer a standard calculation tool but also provide additional information about what-if scenarios with higher-level knowledge about price of modifications and limitations of project sites.

A group of scientists from Spain’s University of Murcia and Netherlands’ Eindhoven University of Technology has developed a methodology that uses modelling and simulation to apply a special kind of dimensioning charts, known as nomograms, in the sizing of off-grid PV systems linked to storage.

“The methodology can be used at any latitude in which data about irradiance is available,” research co-author Alfonso Ramallo told pv magazine.

Nomograms are diagrams in which the relationship between three variables is represented by a straight line or curve for each variable. They are usually applied to obtain reliable results quickly by drawing one or more lines.

The scientists specified that off-grid solar-plus-storage system should be sized in a way that results in a good level of storage utilization. “The design of cost-effective PV-battery systems is a challenging task because both meteorological parameters and load profiles are highly dynamic and stochastic, featuring both seasonal and diurnal variations,” they stated in the paper Nomograms for de-complexing the dimensioning of off-grid PV systems, published in Renewable Energy.

The first step of the proposed methodology consists of calculating a project’s power generation ratio, which is obtained by calculating the consumers’ average electric demand and normalizing it with the nominal power of the PV installation. The research group created an auxiliary graph to enable the calculation of this ratio without a computer.

The second step consists of normalizing the capacity of the battery. “It is straightforward to add the same normalization to this unit, so we obtain a ratio with dimensions of time, which is highly relevant for the dimensioning of the system as time of blackout is one of the outputs of the nomograms that we want to design,” the Spanish-Dutch group specified. A specific nomogram was also obtained to calculate this value.

The resulting graphic contains information on the values calculated in the first two steps and a third value given by the number of blackout days. “Through these three parameters, the simplified sizing process of the off-grid system will be considered complete,” the academics explained. “Fixing two of the values, the chart will give the third one as output.” Battery efficiency, losses and all users’ profiles are also included as variables in the chart.

The methodology, which allows the measurement of the effect of battery performance and losses of an off-grid solar-plus-storage system, can also easily show, according to the scientists, that these parameters do not substantially change the shape of the curves. “As one could expect, the performance of the battery affects the results in a larger manner when installations with large levels of battery storage are selected; whereas the effect of the performance of the generator affects installations with all sizes of batteries as one also may expect,” they stated.

The group claim that the developed nomograms not only offer a standard calculation tool but also provide additional information about what-if scenarios with higher-level knowledge about price of modifications and site limitations.

IRENA presents $2tn plan to drive 5.5m renewables jobs by 2023

Doubling down on renewable energy investment and energy transition spending is required to ensure a truly green global recovery from the Covid-19 crisis and its economic aftershock, claims the International Renewable Energy Agency.

The International Renewable Energy Agency (IRENA) has used its annual renewable energy jobs report to urge governments to more than double annual investment in energy transition technology to almost $2 trillion from next year to 2023 so renewables employment can drive the global recovery from Covid-19.

The UAE-based international body said investment on that scale could generate 5.5 million new clean energy jobs by 2023, more than compensating for a million job losses in the fossil fuel industry over the same period. If the world then spent an average $4.5 trillion per year on clean energy tech for the remainder of the decade, IRENA claimed, renewables would employ 30 million people by 2030 and account for 42 million jobs in a 100 million-strong energy sector workforce in mid century, with a further 21 million working in energy efficiency at that point and almost 15 million employed in grid and energy flexibility.

Those 2050 employment numbers would add up to 62% more energy sector jobs than are envisaged under the current plans of governments around the world, said IRENA.

Solar jobs up

The solar workforce expanded 4% last year, from 2018, according to the latest Renewable Energy and Jobs report published by IRENA, to account for 3.8 million roles in a renewable energy workforce which rose from 11 million in 2018 to 11.5 million last year.

With 3.1 million of those 3.8 million PV workers employed in Asia, China led with 2.2 million jobs, well ahead of second-placed Japan, which saw its solar workforce fall to 241,000 last year. The U.S. employed around 240,000 people in solar last year, India 204,000 and Bangladesh 137,000. The EU saw its solar workforce leap during 2019, from 95,600 to 127,300, with Europe employing 4.4% of the global solar workforce, ahead of Africa, which accounted for 3.7%, but trailing North America, which employed 6.5% of the world’s solar workers.

The importance of off-grid solar for global employment was emphasized by the estimate the 95,000 people employed by the decentralized solar segment in India last year is expected to double by 2022-23, with the 10,000 employed in the industry in Kenya expected to rise 70% over the same period. The off-grid solar workforce of Nigeria is expanded to expand tenfold to 52,000 by 2022-23 with distributed-generation systems also employing a potentially huge informal workforce whose numbers are difficult to estimate. Add in the employment opportunities offered by the arrival of electricity in off-grid areas and IRENA estimates the industry can drive a fivefold increase in the number of people employed in such communities.

The jobs update, which referenced articles by pv magazine writers Emiliano Bellini, Uma Gupta, Syful Islam, Marija Maisch, Pilar Sanchez Molina and Jorge Zarco – plus a guest article by Svitlana Teush – cited familiar hurdles to solar deployment in India including low electricity tariff ceilings, land scarcity, grid shortfalls, delayed payments, attempts to renegotiate power purchase agreements and import duties, as well as currency devaluation. The importance of India developing a domestic solar manufacturing industry was also highlighted, with mention of an estimate by KPMG such a sector could save the country $42 billion in import costs by 2030 as well as creating 50,000 direct and 125,000 indirect jobs over a five-year period.

The IRENA report stated the Indian solar workforce fell 14% to 109,000 last year due to the weaknesses stated but cast doubt on a recent claim by private-sector body RES4Africa that India had made no specific provision for retraining fossil fuel workers to equip them for the energy transition. According to the IRENA report, India’s Skill Council for Green Jobs has established more than 350 training centers in seven states and trained more than 25,000 solar installers and engineers.

Threat

IRENA pointed out the threat new technology such as drones and artificial intelligence posed to clean energy job numbers, noting that a technician requires around 10 hours to inspect each megawatt of solar generation capacity whereas a drone can cover the same ground in 15-18 minutes. Such applications “will shape the labor intensity of renewables in years to come,” stated the report.

The country-by-country solar employment figures showed up some surprising developments, including confirmation last year’s ‘solar gold rush’ in Vietnam had transformed employment in the sector there, with 56,700 PV-related jobs in 2019 – the government had anticipated only 45,000 by 2030. The Philippines saw a big rise in solar employment, from 20,800 to 33,700 and various policy initiatives and big projects further swelled global numbers, with around 3,000 people employed at Egypt’s huge Benban solar field alone.

Indonesia‘s bid to install 1 GW per year for at least the next four years could drive 22,000 PV jobs, said IRENA, and Algeria’s plans to install 4 GW of solar capacity via five annual tenders to 2024 could employ 56,000 people in construction and then 2,000 in operations and maintenance. Similarly, South Korea’s 13,800-strong solar workforce in 2018 could be swelled by 4,500 new employees thanks to a plan to put solar on a million roofs in Seoul by 2023.

This is your SolarWakeup for September 30th, 2020

First In 12. Much to my surprise and many others, Chris Wallace went off script last night (there wasn’t much of a script at this point anyways) and asked a climate change question to Trump and Biden. This was the first climate change question in 12 years according to Grist reporting in a presidential debate. I won’t cover the answers, it ranged from raking the forest to weatherizing buildings and regulating methane. Biden did call out the SunShot success in lowering the cost of solar to record levels, a nice mention of our industry.

The Role of Labor. We don’t talk about this often, our industry is different, but it should also be part of the discussion. Many of the utility and oil infrastructure jobs are part of major labor unions. Labor has been one of the major political forces fighting solar policies in State capitols. The crush on oil, COVID aside, has very little to do with our industry that would fall more on the EV infrastructure and utility sector. The utility sector tends to take a very strong position fighting against labor unions. Solar on the other hand is largely silent but we shouldn’t be. I believe that I would be directionally correct in saying that 50% of solar capacity is installed in partnership with labor unions including large scale solar in California, many public projects across the country as well as DG projects in states like NJ, MA, NY and IL. I would love to hear your view on this, including data that may support or refute my thoughts.

No Congressional Acts Likely. Senator Whitehouse is holding out hope for the Senate to take up climate legislation. As much as I would love for the Senator to be right, he may have thought this to be true before last night’s debate.

EPA, SCOTUS, and What If. In the week’s leading up to and after the selection of Kamala Harris as the VP, we wrote about how she could lead the fight against climate change by taking on polluters with laws like the clean air and water acts. In reality, these laws are on more nuanced standing after the passing of Justice Ginsberg who wrote the opinion giving the EPA the power to regulate emissions. The case for regulatory overreach was often argued by Justice Scalia including as recently in 2015 in Michigan v EPA where Scalia wrote the opinion for the 5-4 majority. If you recall, I quoted Justice Ginsburg’s 6-2 majority opinion from the EPA v EME Homer City in 2014 which gave the EPA more ability to regulate emissions across the Country. With the balance of the court changing, based on Judge Coney Barrett’s comments that Scalia’s views are her views, you can imagine some ability for a Biden/Harris administration having more difficulty executing on the pollution enforcement strategy I outlined just a few weeks ago.

Solar Market Update Call. The solar market can be considered complex and fast moving but if you join this monthly market call you can make sense of it. Register for the next Roth Capital solar market call on October 2nd at 10am Eastern.

Get The Power. Later this year, the residential solar market is going to get some major savings with most of their balance of systems when the shift to higher power solar modules really gets going. With power density going up more than 10%, those savings will trickle down to mounts, rails, inverters, labor and wire and hopefully into installers’ wallets. Make sure you are getting the best modules and pricing possible by joining the SolarWakeup Buyer’s Group. You can see the pricing on our price discovery page.

Opinion

New York Times: How Coal-Loving Australia Became the Leader in Rooftop Solar

Best, Yann

The post This is your SolarWakeup for September 30th, 2020 appeared first on SolarWakeup.com.

Assessing potential of facade PV modules

A new building at the Helmholtz-Zentrum Berlin (HZB) is being covered with facade CGIS solar panels provided by German manufacturer Avancis. A research team will analyze their performance and special features, including new sensors for incident radiation and heat.

German research institute Helmholtz-Zentrum Berlin (HZB) is setting up a building-integrated photovoltaics (BIPV) facade on a new building under construction that will be used as a testing facility for a special kind of copper, indium, gallium and selenium (CIGS) solar modules provided by German manufacturer Avancis.

“The concept of our project is to analyze a building with a complete PV facade system with three facade directions,” Björn Rau, head of the HZB’s Consulting Office for Building-Integrated Photovoltaics (BAIP), told pv magazine.

Rau and his team will monitor 360 modules distributed on the facades in 38 strings according to their electrical parameter. The modules are installed in landscape format, with each panel having two horizontal back rails which are glued on the back-side glass, without the need of frames and screws. “On our construction site, the installers mounted two additional vertical rails on these back rails, which also contain two rods,” Rau explained. “These rods are used to hook the modules into a preliminary installed vertical sub construction which was initially mounted on the wall.”

Sensors

Special sensors will also be tested in 45 panels on the building. These are intended to find out over the next few years how real weather conditions, fine dust, rain and pollution affect the module performance. “The sensors are so called one-wire digital thermometers, directly glued on the back side-glass and thermally shielded on the outside,” Rau specified. “In addition to the temperature measurements, we also have flowmeters installed to measure the vertical airspeed behind the modules at different places in the facade.”

He also explained that in addition to a complex weather station, which will be installed on the roof of the building, the team will also monitor the solar irradiation directly in the facade. “Therefore, we placed a couple of tiny irradiation sensors on some edges of modules on all facades,” he added.

“The special feature of the modules is the concealed suspension, which allows a frameless design without additional visible hardware at the edge of the module,” explained HZB project manager Dirk Mielke. “This allows the modules to be ideally combined with the metal curtain wall of the building. Each module has an output of approximately 135 watts. In total, we have an installed peak power of almost 50 kilowatts.”

Potential

According to Rau, BIPV facade solar panels are not a simple PV element anymore, but a building element too, as they fulfill normal and necessary functions in the building skin and, in addition, they generate electricity. In his view, BIPV systems on buildings “activate” existing facades without competing much with alternative applications, such as rooftop arrays. “Especially higher buildings provide much larger areas of facades than of roofs and therefore a higher potential,” he stressed. “Furthermore, integrated solutions are not in competition with agricultural use, recreation or preservation of nature like ground-mounted installations.”

He is also sure that, with an increasing market size, solutions for integrated PV will soon be available for lower costs than today — “especially if companies are able to place standard products on the market with a general building approval and a systemic concept,” Rau affirmed. “Such approaches already exist, but they also need other market drivers. I guess, political measures like specific building regulations for CO2 footprints and nearly zero-energy building (NZEB) will be necessary.”

Australia’s national science agency to buy solar power under 10-year PPA

CSIRO, Australia’s national science agency, has signed a 10-year PPA with Ross Garnaut’s Zen Energy. The deal will see solar energy from two solar parks halve the agency’s emissions.

From pv magazine Australia.

Australia’s Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation (CSIRO) has announced a 10-year clean energy Power Purchase Agreement (PPA) with Ross Garnaut’s Sunshot owned Zen Energy.

The deal is set to halve the national science agency’s electricity-sourced CO2 emissions. It is the largest PPA yet signed by a Commonwealth government agency, according to CSIRO.

In The Way of Zen, Alan Watts tells us that Zen is not a religion or a philosophy, nor even a psychology or a science – it is a way of liberation. In this way, the transition to renewable energy is a Zen transition, for it is liberation from the fossil fuel fetters of finitude and into a present and future of renewable infinitude, the only way to self-sufficiency. CSIRO appears to be on the way to Zen through this PPA, utilising the 128 MW Nurmurkah Solar Farm in Victoria and and the 132 MW Nevertire Solar Farm in NSW.

These renewable sources will now electrify 26 CSIRO-managed research sites in the Australian Capital Territory, New South Wales and Victoria, including the legendary Parkes Observatory and the Australian Centre for Disease Preparedness in Geelong, a key research centre in the fight against Covid-19.

“This is a very significant step towards being net-zero in our operations, and is in line with our broader remit to help Australia navigate to a low emissions future,” said Dave Agnew, CSIRO’s director of Business and Infrastructure Services.

The deal also follows the recently completed rollout of 5 MW of solar PV across 10 CSIRO sites nationwide.

The way of Zen

British billionaire Sanjeev Gupta, owner of Whyalla steelworks, sold Zen Energy back to Australian economist professor Ross Garnaut in August. The company is now part of Garnaut’s Sunshot Energy business. According to the ABC, Garnaut said at the time of the deal that Zen Energy would “look forward to partnering with new utility-scale renewable energy projects across the country to enable us to supply 100% renewable energy at low cost and high reliability to our growing customer base.”

The PPA with CSIRO demonstrates that Zen Energy is doing exactly what Garnaut said it would.

Interestingly, the PPA is not the limit of the partnership between CSIRO and Zen Energy, as the pair are also looking to collaborate on scientific projects in renewable energy.

“We aspire to be an organisation that promotes and demonstrates sustainable operations and practices that are consistent with our science and innovation impact,” Agnew said. “As a world leader in sustainability research, CSIRO is committed to innovate science and technology that reduces emissions and global climate change impacts.”