The IEA released a report predicting that the world is set to make abundant energy by the second half of the decade given the surge in batteries and solar panels but that there’ll also be an excess of fossil fuels. It notes that the world is still way off from what’s needed to meet the warming cap set by the Paris Agreement — because emissions would decline too slowly at the current rate. Predictably, China is driving global energy trends for both clean energy and fossil fuels.

This article delves into what works and what doesn’t when aggregating distributed assets with virtual power plants. It looks at the role of the opt-out method, customer skepticism, lack of standardization, and the model’s future growth and barriers.

This article explores how UL certification is updating to include cyberattacks under its umbrella. SPW talks with an NREL cyber engineer about his process re strengthening cybersecurity for resi and other markets. He talks about their research and his efforts to build relationships with inverter manufacturers, utilities, aggregators, cloud service providers and other stakeholders to discern what’s needed.

Fluke has rolled out its 283 FC Solar Digital Multimeter and a283 FC True-RMS Wireless Clamp for solar pros for testing individual panels and strings or inverters in an array. The tech is meant to enhance safety while providing pros with reliable and repeatable results. Features include video and audio polarity indicators, as well as a user-defined limit gauge.

The DOE is investing $43.2 million in 21 projects for decarbonization tech across industrial subsectors. The bulk of the money will go to projects focused on electrification of industrial heat, efficient energy use in industrial systems, and decarbonization of organic wastewater and wet waste treatment. This will impact building operators of commercial and industrial buildings.

SPW looks at the uncertainty brought by the Supreme Court’s summer decision to overturn the 40-year-old precedent that said those with federal agency expertise should interpret ambiguous laws passed by Congress. The move was a longtime goal of fossil fuel industries and anti-regulation advocates. The ruling will probably lead to challenges of many older laws under the EPA dominion. Plus, renewables advocates are questioning whether aspects of the IRA may also soon be under review.

In this Solar Conversation, Kerim Baran of SolarAcademy talks with Jason Higginson, Head of Marketing at APsystems, one of the global leaders in multi-platform Module Level Power Electronics (MLPE) solutions for the solar PV industry. In this Solar Conversation, Kerim and Jason talked about the launch of APsystems QT2, APsystems’ new microinverter designed for Commercial and Industrial (C&I) solar applications. The duo cover the following topics and more:

• • RE+ 2024 Observations
  • APsystems’ new C&I Microinverter: APsystems QT2
  • Myths around C&I Solar and Microinverters
  • QT2’s product design and pricing benefits
  • Ideal use cases for APsystems QT2 C&I microinverters