Lodestone inks 20-year, 100% offset agreement with poultry giant Inghams
Aotearoa New Zealand grid-scale solar developer Lodestone Energy has partnered with leading poultry provider Inghams in a landmark 20-year agreement where energy from Lodestone’s North Island solar farms will 100% match Inghams electricity consumption.
NZ generator gets green light for 400 MW solar farm
Electricity generator and retailer Nova Energy is moving ahead with what is to be New Zealand’s largest solar farm after receiving the green light to build a 400 MW PV power plant near Taupō in the centre of the country’s North Island.
Property owners look to large-scale solar to revitalise land
Renewables developer Lodestone Energy will build a 220 MW solar farm on one of New Zealand’s iconic high-country grazing properties with the landowners targeting the PV facility to help rehabilitate redundant land.
Edify plans solar and storage complex near Queensland coal plant
Australian renewables developer Edify Energy is planning to take advantage of existing infrastructure to maximise its access to the national electricity grid by building a 200 MW solar farm and four-hour duration battery energy storage system near the Callide coal-fired power station in central Queensland.
Austrian startup offers double-axis tracking system for agrivoltaics
Anywhere Solar says its new trackers have a module area of 75 m2 and can host PV systems up to 19 kW in size. When deployed horizontally, the systems allow vehicles up to 4.3 meters high to pass underneath.
Guide plots path to enhanced land productivity on solar farms
A New South Wales community group has launched a guide it says provides a framework that will enable solar farms developers to improve biodiversity on project sites and build trust in neighbouring communities without compromising PV generation capacity.
Grass is greener on Acen’s New England Solar Farm
The first stage of Acen Australia’s planned 720 MW New England Solar Farm is home to more than 6,000 sheep that are grazing beneath the panels in a proof-of-concept agrivoltaics project that has no-one sitting on the fence regarding the results.
Renewed push on agrivoltaics could help resolve conflict in rural communities
With opposition to large-scale renewables transmission projects being expressed in some rural and regional communities, solar’s ability to be coupled with agriculture could present opportunities for collaboration rather than conflict.
Solar sites linked to higher levels of insects
Scientists conducting a five-year research project in the United States have observed a tripling of insect numbers near two solar facilities built on rehabilitated agricultural land. They say the findings show how habitat-friendly solar could help protect insect populations and improve pollination in nearby agricultural fields.
BYD unveils new agrivoltaics module
Chinese module maker BYD is producing a new bifacial monocrystalline panel at its manufacturing facility in Sao Paulo, Brazil. The module has a power output of up to 355 W and a conversion efficiency of 16.33%.
