Magazine Archive 02-2015

Solar flight: Solar panels have been a ubiquitous sight on satellites since the dawn of space travel, but their use thus far has only ever been secondary to more traditional power sources. Solar Impulse, however, hopes to break these boundaries when it embarks on the world’s first round-the-world, solar-powered-only flight in March. pv magazine gets up close and personal with the craft – and crew – attempting this historic feat.

System management: The smaller a PV plant, the harder it is to implement economically feasible power plant management. Manfred Bächler, the General Director of Pervorm, explains the key considerations in technical management of small and medium-sized PV plants under 100 kWp.

O&M: It sounds so simple: Keep the modules clean and cut the grass. However, O&M offerings are becoming more and more sophisticated, as prices for software, technology and soft costs are coming down.

Italy: Tommaso Angela, an analyst with Prothea, a Milan-based investment firm specialized in renewable energy, gives an overview of the Italian solar market as well as the trends and players in the Italian renewable energy financial market.

PV is all grown up. In its 2014 clean energy investment analysis released last month, Bloomberg New Energy Finance found that global investment in solar reached almost $150 billion for the year, its largest-ever slice of the clean energy pie. BNEF noted that some large solar investments, such as Japan’s $1.1 billion 250 MW Setouchi […]