We wrapped our arms around California’s new Building Energy Efficiency standards in Installment I of the Countdown to 2020. In this installment, we take a closer look at how these 80,000 annual additions to the solar pipeline (based on historical averages) will more broadly impact the California solar market. RegulationsRead More

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. Their findings, published in the journal Environmental Science & Technology, reveal for the first time the potential for floatingRead More

The U.S. Department of Energy’s (DOE’s) National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL) has been awarded nearly $2.8 million in funding to develop a system for grid electricity storage and power generation that includes a high-temperature charging device, low-cost thermal energy storage modules, a high-performance heat exchanger, and a closed-loop Brayton cycleRead More

Rigid silicon solar panels dominate the utility and residential markets, but opportunity exists for thin-film photovoltaic and emerging technologies notable for being lightweight and flexible, according to scientists at the U.S. Department of Energy’s National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL). Thin films such as cadmium telluride (CdTe) and copper indium galliumRead More

Shaving the peaks off commercial and industrial (C&I) electric bills is the top revenue stream for energy storage systems, and given the trend in increasing utility charges for time-of-use consumption, peak shaving can pay for a system in as little as three years, system providers say. Just how high theRead More

The National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL) updated its publicly available online solar+storage optimization tool, REopt Lite, which can be used to determine the sizing of resilient power technologies designed to support critical services. Recent disasters in places such as Puerto Rico, where widespread outages contributed to devastating loss of life, underscore howRead More

One of the largest barriers to solar adoption on a wide scale is the wealth gap, and it will require more problem-solving than a mandate to overcome it. A new report released by the National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL) shows that nearly half (42 percent) of all the United States’Read More

Something that’s not talked about enough: one of the largest barriers to solar adoption and a game-changing move into a distributed generation future is the wealth gap. A new report released by the National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL) shows that nearly half of all the United States’ residential rooftop solarRead More

As perovskite solar cells set efficiency records and the nascent technology becomes more stable, another major challenge remains: the issue of scalability, according to researchers at the Department of Energy’s National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL). “It is scalable,” said Kai Zhu, a materials science researcher at NREL. “We just needRead More

How long a product can be expected to perform at a high level is a fundamental indication of quality and durability. In the solar industry, accurately predicting the longevity of photovoltaic (PV) panels is essential to increase energy production, lower costs, and raise investor and consumer confidence. A new softwareRead More