Global solar PV manufacturing capacity expansion plans rebound in Q1 – First quarter 2017 saw 10GW announced of solar power manufacturing capacity. With global capacity somewhere in the 115-135GW/year this is a big uptick – 7.5-8.5%. A few hours later, I get a Q2 announcement of a 2GW solar factory coming to Taiwan. This tells me that the demand of solar PV is predicted to continue to grow, and that significant investment in new factories, new machines and new technologies will continue. And since newer technologies, at the same price or lower than old technologies, are more efficiency – we will see continued increases in efficiency in the coming years.

Maryland governor has battery tax credit law on desk – The measure provides for a 30 percent tax credit on the installed cost of a storage system, capped at $5,000 for residential and $75,000 for commercial projects. The total credits awarded cannot exceed $750,000 in a year, and the program will run from 2018 through 2022. This is against state taxes – and state tax rates are lower than federal – so its not as strong as the federal incentive for solar, but its pretty close – and it will drive business. A Tesla PowerWall 2, costing $5500 retail plus about $500-2000 to install, will end up costing $4,200-5300 after $1,800-2300 tax credit.

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A new project put in motion in South Australia in order to help with the region’s energy problems is likely to become the largest solar plus battery project in the world.

Lyon Group, an energy company backed by Mitsubishi, Blackstone and Magnetar Capital, has announced that it secured land and is in the “advanced stages” of negotiations for a grid connection on a 330 MW solar farm linked to a 100 MW/400 MWh battery installation.

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John Goodenough, who is credited as the co-inventor of the li-ion battery cell, and his team at the Cockrell School of Engineering have released their findings of what is being described as a “breakthrough” for solid-state batteries.

We don’t really like to report on battery “breakthroughs” since most of them are usually just sensationalist statements that don’t really qualify as “breakthroughs” or amount to anything, but it appears that Goodenough’s findings could be good enough to qualify as a breakthrough if you can excuse the bad pun.  expand full story

Contemporary Amperex Technology Co., Limited (CATL), a relatively new Chinese li-ion battery maker, is shaping up to become a major player in the industry in the coming years with plans for several important battery factories comparable in size to Tesla’s Gigafactory.

The company has now signed a supply contract with SAAB successor National Electric Vehicle Sweden (NEVS) in order for the electric vehicle maker to deliver on its orders for electric car fleets in China. expand full story

Have you seen an all-electric commercial airplane before? Neither have we or anyone. But Luke Workman, a highly regarded battery designer, thinks that he has an idea that will make that become a reality in the not so distant future. He hopes to accomplish this through optimizing existing battery technology and designing the battery layouts in planes so that they become more efficient and effective for long distance travel.

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The partnership between Tesla Energy and Advanced Microgrid Solutions (AMS) recently won yet another contract to install energy storage in California. This time, AMS will be developing a system for Morgan Stanley’s One Maritime Plaza skyscraper in San Francisco. expand full story

Near Melbourne, Australia lies an incredible suburban project underway dubbed Yarrabend. This development is currently home to 60 houses and is planned to eventually hit around 2500. What is unique about this venture is not only the art, food or shopping that will be near it, but that all of the houses will come standard with Tesla Powerwalls and solar panels. Via the Heidelberg Leader, Nick Marinakis, sales and marketing manager of the Glenvill development team for Yarrabend, states that the suburb…

will achieve the highest possible ESD rating under the UDIA (Urban Development Institute of Australia) Envirodevelopment scheme, a first for an infill development site in Melbourne.

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The Economic Times released an interesting article with a reaching title ‘How Elon Musk’s Tesla Motors maybe killing flamingos with its electric cars‘ yesterday. The claim is so absurd that it prompted Musk to mock it on Twitter:

While the endangerment of the Flamigos’ environment is not a laughing matter, the publication’s link back to Musk and Tesla certainly looks like one. expand full story

A new research report from Lux Research looked into the projected growth of the battery sector for electric vehicles (BEVs and PHEVs) and concluded that the market will rise to $10 Billion in 2020 with six large carmakers led by Tesla accounting for 90% of the demand. expand full story