#European solar installations soar 50%

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Solar Panel System Installations in Europe Grows by 50%

Another report from industry bunch Sun based Power Europe shows that sun-oriented establishments in the European Association expanded by practically half year-over-year in 2022, to a record 41.4 GW of age limit.

"The numbers are clear. Sun oriented is offering a help in the midst of energy and environment emergencies," said Walburga Hemetsberger, Chief of Sun based Power Europe. "No other energy source is developing as fast or dependably as sunlight based."

Finding different wellsprings of energy has become basic for the vast majority European nations, which for a really long time have depended on gaseous petrol from Russia. The inventory of gas has decreased after Russia's attack of Ukraine. The Worldwide Energy Organization has said the EU needs to introduce around 60 GW of sun-oriented power in 2023 to make up for shortages in Russian gas.

Germany Leads New Limit

Germany introduced more sun-oriented power limit than some other EU country, adding around 8 GW of new age in 2022. Germany has shut a large portion of its coal-terminated and thermal energy stations as the nation changes to sustainable power. The nation had arranged a total stage out of atomic power before the current year's over, yet government authorities have called for three plants to stay in activity until basically mid-April of the following year.

A report from Solar Power Europe shows sunlight-based power age limit filled quickly in 2022, contrasted with 2021, with Germany driving the way in new introduced limit across the EU. Source: SolarPower Europe

Spain added 7.5 GW of sun-based age limit this year, as per the report. Poland (4.9 GW), the Netherlands (4 GW), and France (2.7 GW) balance the main five. Poland moved from a net-metering to a net-charging methodology in April of this current year. That change, alongside high-power costs and a quickly developing utility-scale fragment, added to its better speed of sun-oriented reception.

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Portugal moved into the best 10 interestingly, with SolarPower Europe revealing the nation had a 251% expansion in sunlight-based age limit.

The report said, "The limited scale PV [photovoltaic] section has supported the market, because of the country's good Super bonus 110% impetus plan, and high-power costs which have worked on the allure of self-utilization plans of action."

The EU's all out sunlight-based power limit became by 25%, from 167.5 GW in 2021 to 208.9 GW in 2022, as per SPE. The business body conjectures yearly PV development in Europe will be 53.6 GW in 2023, and 85 GW in 2026, as per its "most probable" situation. This implies the EU sun powered market is set to beyond twofold in no less than four years, coming to 484 GW by 2026.

Repower EU, a European Commission intend to extend inexhaustible power age across the coalition, calls for environmentally friendly power to supply no less than 45% of the EU's power by 2030. The report delivered Tuesday said the EU will require more laborers who can introduce sunlight-based chargers and interface sun-oriented exhibits to the power lattice, and proposed additional preparation projects to give qualified specialists.

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Photo voltaic Power Is not Only for Electrical energy

The economic processes that underpin our international economy--manufacturing, gasoline and chemical manufacturing, mining--are enormously advanced and numerous. However they share one key enter: they, in addition to many others, require warmth, and many it, which takes staggering quantities of gasoline to supply. Warmth and steam technology is crucial to the worldwide financial system, nevertheless it's additionally an neglected and rising supply of greenhouse gasoline (GHG) emissions. The excellent news is that progressive photo voltaic applied sciences can produce steam at industrial scale--reducing emissions and, more and more, reducing prices. And given the present local weather outlook, it is pressing that undertake these new applied sciences. Regardless of huge progress world wide to ramp up renewables and improve vitality effectivity, international GHG emissions reached an all-time excessive in 2018. In a report launched in January, the Rhodium Group discovered that though renewable vitality installations soared and coal vegetation shut down, carbon emissions within the U.S. rose sharply final 12 months. Emissions from shot up 5.7 percent--more than in every other sector, together with transportation and energy technology. The authors of the Rhodium Group research concluded that regardless of elevated efforts from policymakers and the enterprise to deal with emissions, "the industrial sector is still almost entirely ignored." This should change, on the international stage. Worldwide is accountable for 1 / 4 of whole emissions. And whereas these from transportation and residential segments are trending down, the Worldwide Power Company (IEA) initiatives that industrial emissions will develop some 24 p.c by 2050. As individuals world wide proceed to transition from dwelling off the land to shifting to cities and shopping for and consuming extra issues, industrial exercise will proceed to increase--and the necessity to scale back corresponding emissions will change into all of the extra pressing. This brings us again to warmth. Business is the biggest client of vitality, and a shocking 74 p.c of business vitality is within the type of warmth, largely course of steam. Photo voltaic steam--making the solar's warmth work for industry--is a largely unexplored however promising avenue for lowering emissions. Whereas photovoltaic (PV) panels that convert daylight into electrical energy are extra widespread, thermal options are what's wanted to satisfy 's rising demand for warmth. In a photo voltaic thermal system, mirrors focus daylight to accentuate its warmth and produce steam on the excessive temperatures wanted for . One other key benefit is the flexibility to retailer the warmth utilizing easy, confirmed thermal vitality storage in an effort to ship steam 24 hours a day, similar to a standard fossil gasoline plant. With the appropriate expertise, photo voltaic thermal could be a dependable, environment friendly and low-cost vitality supply for industrial steam technology. So-called "enclosed trough technology" makes use of sunshine to supply zero-carbon steam. Credit score: GlassPoint Photo voltaic. For instance, renewable course of warmth supplier Sunvapor is partnering with Horizon Nut to construct a 50-kilowatt photo voltaic thermal set up at a pistachio processing facility within the Central Valley of California. The businesses are working to broaden photo voltaic steam manufacturing for meals processes, equivalent to pasteurization, drying and roasting. In Oman and California, GlassPoint Photo voltaic is working and growing among the world's largest photo voltaic initiatives for . GlassPoint's greenhouse-enclosed mirrors monitor the solar all through the day, focusing warmth on pipes containing water. The concentrated daylight boils the water to generate steam, which is utilized by Oman's largest oil producer to extract oil from the bottom. The capability of GlassPoint's Miraah plant, which might presently ship 660 metric tons of steam each day, will high 1 gigawatt of photo voltaic thermal vitality when accomplished. This similar expertise can be being deployed in California to cut back emissions from one of many nation's largest and oldest working oilfields. In the meantime, to satisfy the wants of extraordinarily high-temperature (800-1,000 levels C) industrial processes, the European Union is growing SOLPART, a analysis mission to develop photo voltaic thermal vitality that can be utilized to supply cement, lime and gypsum. Whereas fossil fuels stay the dominant supply of warmth for throughout all sectors and areas, is starting to discover cleaner alternatives--and in some instances, is leveraging photo voltaic steam on a major scale. As expertise advances, increasingly corporations will discover that switching to photo voltaic steam can concurrently scale back prices and emissions, bettering enterprise operations whereas shrinking its carbon footprint. In relation to mitigating local weather change, most consideration has been directed to the issues we see, purchase, or use on a every day basis--the automobiles we drive, the meals we eat, the facility vegetation that maintain our lights on. However behind all these actions is course of warmth, an emissions supply that has been largely ignored. Now we should flip our consideration to industry--the sleeping large of local weather motion. Course of warmth is an neglected alternative to slash GHG emissions, and photo voltaic applied sciences working on the scale wanted by are presently out there. It is time to embrace them and cease industrial warmth from heating up our planet. Read the full article

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Rigid Sails and Solar Power for Zero Emission Shipping

The shipping industry is currently adapting to a number of major challenges related to reducing greenhouse gas emissions and moving towards decarbonisation. The International Maritime Organization (IMO) has outlined an ambitious greenhouse gas (GHG) reduction strategy and the European Union (EU) has also unveiled its own plan to reduce shipping related GHG emissions. Consequently there is an emerging shift away from heavy fuel oils and the recent grounding of the MV Wakashio is likely to reinforce this trend. 

Renewable energy is a source of emissions free power and on-board ships it can be harnessed by various means including rigid sails and solar panels. At the moment though, neither of these options have gained widespread acceptance in the shipping sector with just a few initial projects completed and others in the planning stages. However both have the potential to significantly reduce vessel emissions especially as the underlying technologies continue to be improved.

Past Use of Rigid Sails on Ships

Sails have been used by vessels of all types for thousands of years but with the advent of steam engines their use on ships carrying world trade gradually declined from the 1800’s. In the 1980's though, several Japanese ships were fitted with rigid sails with the aim of reducing fuel consumption. This was largely driven by the oil crisis in the 1970's which resulted in oil shortages and prices soaring. During this time ships fitted with rigid sails including the Shin Aitoku Maru and Usuki Pioneer proved that these devices were an effective source of supplementary propulsion. Various reports suggest fuel consumption was reduced through the use of these sails by approximately 10-30% under favourable conditions.

These sails were not the primary source of propulsive power though. Even so, they were capable of moving these ships at low speeds without the use of the main engines. So not only did the sails reduce fuel consumption but they could also be used as a source of emergency propulsion if conditions were suitable. However when the oil crisis passed the viability of rigid sails in terms of fuel cost savings was undermined and only a small number of ships were fitted with them.

Marine Solar Power

Recent advances in marine-grade solar cell and photovoltaic (PV) module technologies have led to solar power becoming a cost effective fuel reduction option on pleasure boats, passenger ferries and tourist vessels. Even so, although PV modules may be designated “marine-grade” by the manufactures, those to be used for ship projects need to be evaluated carefully to avoid problems after installation. 

Based on the performance of PV modules currently available the amount of fuel that could be saved on a ship through the use of solar power alone is relatively small. Nonetheless there is scope to use solar power together with more energy efficient electrical devices such as low power LED lighting to improve energy efficiency and supply ships with an emissions free source of electrical power.

Rigid sail installed on a ship during the 1980’s. (Source: Teramoto Iron Works)

Wind and Solar Power

In Japan a solution has been devised by Eco Marine Power (EMP) that combines wind-assisted propulsion (WAP) with marine solar power and a computer control and automation system. This solution is known as Aquarius Marine Renewable Energy (or Aquarius MRE®). A ship fitted with Aquarius MRE will be able to tap into the limitless, albeit variable, power of the wind and sun. These hybrid powered ships will use renewable energy to supplement the power from the ship's main engines and generators thereby reducing fuel consumption and emissions. During a recent study for example it was estimated that rigid sails arranged as an array on a modified Panamax bulker with a total sail area of 1400 m2 could potentially provide on a voyage basis, an average of nearly 8% of the propulsive power required and under ideal conditions this surpassed 20%. This figure could also be significantly higher if the ship operated below 12 knots. Additionally this estimate only included the propulsive power derived from the rigid sails and not power obtained via the PV modules on the sails or solar panel arrays located elsewhere on the ship.

Impression of Aquarius MRE on Aquarius Eco Ship Design Concept (Source: Eco Marine Power)

A core technology within Aquarius MRE is a patented rigid sail technology - the EnergySail®. This innovative device may incorporate a number of renewable energy devices and can be fitted as part of an array or as a stand-alone device. A lab prototype of the EnergySail has completed land-based feasibility tests including testing with the automated control system and a second factory produced EnergySail has been manufactured by Teramoto Iron Works in Onomichi, Japan. This second land-based device is being used for further shore based testing and demonstrations. Further patent applications related to the EnergySail are also likely as the design continues to evolve.

EnergySail Demonstration Unit at the Onomichi Marine Technology Test Center in Japan (Source: Eco Marine Power)

The marine solar power sub-system within Aquarius MRE is known as Aquarius Marine Solar Power. Components of this sub-system were installed on-board the high speed ferry Blue Star Delos as part of a joint evaluation project and a second upgraded marine solar power system has been installed on-board the large general cargo ship MV Panamana in cooperation with Zeaborn Ship Management (Singapore) and Masterbulk. This system utilised for the first time class-approved UB-50 hybrid batteries from The Furukawa Battery Company and the system was installed entirely by the ship’s crew. In the future other battery types might also be used including the FCR series due to their long life, safety and reliability. These valve-regulated lead acid batteries (VRLA) are recyclable plus less complicated and less costly to install when compared to lithium-ion batteries. 

Next Steps & Further Challenges

In late 2017 EMP announced that it was working towards sea trials of Aquarius MRE. These trials will bring together the complete system on-board a ship for the first time. Additional lab and shore based testing is also being conducted before these trials and variations of the system developed. Furthermore EMP and its strategic partners are currently working towards obtaining Approval-in-Principle (AIP) for Aquarius MRE from ClassNK and investigating what other technologies could be integrated into the system architecture. These other technologies may include fuel cells, air lubrication systems, electric propulsion and other renewable energy devices.

A number of challenges need to be overcome though before a solution like Aquarius MRE can gain widespread acceptance. These challenges include making the system rugged and reliable enough to be able to withstand the marine environment for many years with minimal maintenance required, integrating the solution with the design of ships so that the operation of the vessel is not adversely impacted and ensuring that the safety of the crew and the ship are not compromised. Organizational and cultural barriers also need to be overcome as shipping is often somewhat slow to embrace new solutions. However these barriers are being eroded as it becomes obvious across the industry that things must change and it’s likely that ships being built in future years will reflect this change.

from Storage Containers https://www.maritime-executive.com/article/rigid-sails-and-solar-power-for-zero-emission-shipping via http://www.rssmix.com/