Archive for ‘solar power’

20/11/2014

Cheap Electricity for Poor Squeezing Out Solar in India – Businessweek

The villagers of Dharnai in northern India had been living without electricity for more than 30 years when Greenpeace installed a microgrid to supply reliable, low-cost solar power.

Cooking By Candlelight

Then, within weeks of the lights flickering on in Dharnai’s mud huts, the government utility hooked up the grid — flooding the community with cheap power that undercut the fledgling solar network. While Greenpeace had come to Dharnai at Bihar’s invitation, the unannounced arrival of the state’s utility threatened to put it out of business.

“We wanted to set this up as a business model,” said Abhishek Pratap, a Greenpeace campaigner overseeing the project. “Now we’re in course correction.”

It’s a scenario playing out at dozens of ventures across India’s hinterlands. Competition from state utilities, with their erratic yet unbeatably cheap subsidized power, is scuppering efforts to supply clean, modern energy in a country where more people die from inhaling soot produced by indoor fires than from smoking.

About as many people in India are without electricity as there are residents of the U.S., and the number is growing by a Mumbai every year. Prime Minister Narendra Modi wants to bring electricity to every home by 2019 by leapfrogging the nation’s ailing power-distribution infrastructure with solar-powered local networks — the same way mobile-phones have enabled people in poor, remote places to bypass landlines.

via Cheap Electricity for Poor Squeezing Out Solar in India – Businessweek.

19/11/2014

More nuclear plants and renewable energy under new development plan | South China Morning Post

China will boost oil exploration, use less coal and more natural gas, build more nuclear plants and develop renewable energy under a new seven-year development plan.

nuclear.jpg

The State Council’s newly released plans for 2014-2020 marks the latest attempt by policymakers to limit the nation’s appetite for energy. Reflecting its rapid industrialisation and economic growth, China has become a voracious consumer of energy, changing global energy markets and the geopolitics of energy security.

The document sets out five strategic tasks for the nation’s energy development. The first is to achieve greater energy independence by promoting clean and efficient use of coal, increasing domestic oil production, and developing renewable energy .

China plans to develop new and existing oilfields in nine regions where it has large proven reserves – including in the northwestern, central and northeastern provinces as well as offshore fields in the Bohai Gulf and the East and South China seas.

The plan also calls for boosting offshore oil exploration though improved exploration trace analysis, promoting deep-sea bidding from foreign corporations to develop offshore sites and greater research and development in deep-sea oil discovery technology and equipment.

The plan’s second task is to curb excessive energy consumption and implement energy-efficiency programmes in urban and rural areas. The third task builds on this goal by cutting the proportion of coal used in the nation’s energy production while using more natural gas, nuclear power and renewable energy. The plan calls for more nuclear plants to be built along the coast “at a suitable time” while also studying the feasibility of inland nuclear plants.

The fourth task is to expand international cooperation in energy, establish regional markets and participate in global energy governance. The fifth is to promote innovation in energy-related technology.

via More nuclear plants and renewable energy under new development plan | South China Morning Post.

07/11/2014

China’s Solar Power Push – Businessweek

As the world’s largest emitter of carbon, China has decided that one of the best ways to clean up its polluted air is through solar power. The country has led the world in solar installations for the last two years and will likely do so again in 2015. It’s on pace to reach 33 gigawatts of solar power capacity by the end of 2014, 42 times more than it had in 2010 and more than exists in Spain, Italy, and the U.K. combined, according to Bloomberg New Energy Finance. (The U.S. will have 20 gigawatts by the end of this year.)

Most of China’s solar power comes from sprawling utility-scale solar farms in the country’s rural west. Now the idea is to distribute solar panels in urban areas, putting them on top of office buildings and factories and connecting them to the grid without building miles of costly transmission lines. In 2015, BNEF estimates that China will add as much as 15 gigawatts of solar capacity, enough to power roughly 16 million homes. More than half of that increase will come from cheap panels installed on commercial buildings. If the 2015 projection holds, China will have installed twice as much solar power in factories and office towers in one year than currently exists in all of Australia, one of the world’s sunniest countries.

via China’s Solar Power Push – Businessweek.

26/06/2014

CaptureSolar Raises $107 Million for India Solar Project – Businessweek

CaptureSolar Energy Ltd. raised $107 million for a solar park to supply Indian businesses suffering from rising costs for power generated mostly from coal.

The utility will get 86 percent of the $125 million for the project from Cyprus-based Concept Solutions & Innovations Ltd., CaptureSolar Chief Executive Officer Raju Bhosale said today by phone. Pune-based CaptureSolar will pay for the rest.

The 75-megawatt photovoltaic park will be completed in two phases by March 2015 and charge about 6 rupees (10 U.S. cents) a kilowatt-hour under a 25-year contract, Bhosale said. The price is about 8 percent below the level industrial and commercial businesses currently pay, he said.

via CaptureSolar Raises $107 Million for India Solar Project – Businessweek.

16/04/2014

India Signs Power Contracts for 700 Megawatts of Solar Capacity – Businessweek

India signed contracts to purchase solar power from companies building 700 megawatts of capacity awarded in a national auction.

English: Photovoltaic system with 19 Megawatts...

English: Photovoltaic system with 19 Megawatts peak near Thüngen/Bavaria Deutsch: Solarpark/photovoltaikanlage mit 19 Megawatt Spitzenleistung nahe Thüngen/Bayern (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

The government is waiting to sign purchase agreements for the remaining 50 megawatts from the auction in February, Tarun Kapoor, joint secretary at the Ministry of New and Renewable Energy, said today in an interview in New Delhi. The agreements, which lock in rates for the power generated for 25 years, bind developers to complete the plants within 13 months.

Two developers dropped out after winning bids, including St. Peters, Missouri-based SunEdison Inc. (SUNE:US), which said last week it gave up a 20-megawatt project because local equipment shortages and prices make it unviable. The other developer that Kapoor didn’t identify forfeited its project after failing to get permission from its parent to proceed, he said.

via India Signs Power Contracts for 700 Megawatts of Solar Capacity – Businessweek.

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07/03/2014

BBC News – Chaori Solar in landmark Chinese bond default

Solar panel maker Shanghai Chaori Solar Energy Science & Technology has defaulted on interest payments owed on its bond, say media reports quoting the firm.

Solar panels

It is the first Chinese firm ever to default on its onshore corporate bonds.

On Tuesday, the firm warned it would be unable to make a 89.8 million yuan ($14.6m; £8.7m) interest payment on a one billion yuan bond issued in 2012.

The default is seen as a test case for the Chinese government.

Investors have assumed in the past that the Chinese government would bail out any Chinese corporation in danger of defaulting.

The move to allow Chaori to default signals a new stance.

“There’s never been a corporate bond default, [so] investors have been conditioned that there is no such thing as risk in China,” Leland Miller, president of research firm China Beige Book, told the BBC.

“The Chinese leadership is trying to break down this misunderstanding that everything is backstopped.”

Chaori Solar said it planned to pay 4 million yuan ($654,000) of the interest payment due on the billion yuan bond, which was taken out two years ago.

via BBC News – Chaori Solar in landmark Chinese bond default.

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04/03/2014

India Plans to Manufacture Equipment at Solar Park as Glut Eases – Businessweek

India plans to add solar-equipment manufacturing capacity at a new park in Andhra Pradesh state, saying demand from plants under construction will help the industry recover from a glut of panels.

Solar Energy Corp. of India, the state-run company spearheading the industry’s development, signed an agreement with Andhra Pradesh Industrial Infrastructure Corp. for a solar park in the state that will have 1,000 megawatts of power capacity, as well as factories to produce modules and cells, Rajendra Nimje, managing director of SECI, said in an interview.

The plans come as panel prices appear to be bottoming out after falling more than 60 percent in two years amid a global supply glut. Local manufacturers, such as Indosolar Ltd. (ISLR), Moser Baer India Ltd. and Websol Energy System (WESL) Ltd., who idled about half of their 1,000 megawatts of production capacity, will get fresh orders as new projects are built, Nimje said.

via India Plans to Manufacture Equipment at Solar Park as Glut Eases – Businessweek.

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25/02/2014

EDF-Backed Acme Starts 25-Megawatt Solar Plant in India – Businessweek

Acme Solar Energy Ltd., backed by Electricite de France SA’s renewable unit, started generating power from a 25-megawatt solar plant in central India.

Map of India showing location of Madhya Pradesh

Map of India showing location of Madhya Pradesh (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

The completion of the project in Khilchipur, Madhya Pradesh state, more than doubles Acme Solar’s photovoltaic holdings to 43 megawatts, the company said by e-mail.

The developer, a venture between EDF Energies Nouvelles, Luxembourg-based Eren Groupe SA and India’s Acme Group, plans to jointly develop 200 megawatts of solar capacity.

via EDF-Backed Acme Starts 25-Megawatt Solar Plant in India – Businessweek.

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17/02/2014

India Budget Plans 2 Gigawatts Solar Farms to Double Capacity – Businessweek

India plans to start work on at least 2 gigawatts of solar farms in the year starting April that would nearly double its current photovoltaic capacity.

English: Solar power plant at Om Shanti Retrea...

English: Solar power plant at Om Shanti Retreat Centre, Gurgaon (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

The proposed new capacity would take the form of four so-called mega solar power projects capable of generating more than 500 megawatts each, Finance Minister Palaniappan Chidambaram said today in New Delhi in a speech announcing an interim budget that would provide funds until a new parliament is elected in national polls due by May.

A record 15 percent of about 800 million voters will be eligible to cast ballots for the first time as the rising cost of electricity turns into an electoral issue. With the solar farms announced today and already existing targets, India is planning a sixfold increase in solar capacity by 2017 to reduce blackouts and diversify away from coal and gas-fired plants hamstrung by fuel shortages.

via India Budget Plans 2 Gigawatts Solar Farms to Double Capacity – Businessweek.

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08/02/2014

Hindustan Powerprojects to Build Three North India Solar Plants – Businessweek

Hindustan Powerprojects Pvt., formerly known as Moser Baer Projects Pvt., has signed power-sale contracts for three solar plants in northern India.

The company will build two photovoltaic projects of 15 megawatts each in Punjab state and a 20-megawatt plant in Uttar Pradesh, it said in an e-mailed statement today.

Hindustan Powerprojects didn’t provide details describing the terms under which it would sell the electricity to the local state governments.

via Hindustan Powerprojects to Build Three North India Solar Plants – Businessweek.

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