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100% Renewable Energy for all used wisely and efficiently
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Presidents Column
In early October, at the Invitation of the Ministry of New and Renewable Energy of the Government of India, I flew to New Delhi to participate as a panelist in the 2nd RE-INVEST Renewable Energy Investor’s Meet and Expo. The purpose of this significant conference was to accelerate the worldwide effort to scale up renewable energy and connect the global investment community with Indian energy stakeholders. RE-INVEST 2018 was heavily represented by international public- and private-sector financial and policy experts. The event also hosted the First Assembly of the International Solar Alliance (ISA), of which ISES has applied to be an official partner.
There has been substantial press coverage of this event, especially on the reports of the significant gains India has made towards reaching its official solar target, stipulated in the country’s Solar Mission, of 100 GW installed capacity by 2022, and also of the technical and financial pitfalls that the country could inevitably confront in achieving such a rapid scale-up. These pitfalls include aggressive pricing strategies in renewable energy auctions that could result in non-sustainable financial conditions for the renewable energy projects. (…)
Read the full Presidents column by Dr. David Renné here
Society News
ISES joins global coalition building the energy access workforce
On 31 October at the International Off Grid Renewable Energy Conference (IOREC), a global coalition will announce a new campaign aimed at creating the skilled, inclusive, diverse and equitable energy access workforce that will be needed to fill millions of new jobs and deliver universal energy access by 2030. i.e. Sustainable Development Goal 7 (SDG7). ISES is happy to join Power For All and the many participating agencies in this important step towards achieving 100% renewable energy for all used efficiently and wisely.
Karl Böer Solar Energy Medal of Merit 2018
On 12 October, the University of Delaware awarded the Karl Böer Solar Energy Medal of Merit 2018. The awards ceremony honored the life and career of Dr. Karl Böer a solar energy pioneer. ISES president David Renné remembers Karl Böer: “Through his research, teachings and mentorship, Karl has made significant impact on the growth and success of the solar energy industry. ISES has been very privileged to be a key partner of the Karl Böer Solar Energy Medal of Merit Award. Over the years, this prestigious award has honored the contributions of solar energy researchers and advocates. He also made an important contribution to the Society in his publication of the two-volume Fifty Year History of the International Solar Energy Society and its national Sections.”
This year’s award winner, Alex Zunger was honoured for his significant contributions to solar energy, pioneering new theories to improve the performance of solar devices and using unconventional approaches to find new materials to power solar technology. The selection committee cited Zunger’s “outstanding and transformative contributions to the understanding of photovoltaic (PV) and electronic materials interfaces, nanostructure and defects, providing theory guidance to improving device performance, and his first-principles development of innovative ‘inverse design’ for materials discovery.” Please see the complete press release on this year’s award ceremony here.
Congratulations to Alex Zunger on receiving this prestigious award.
Solar Energy Journal – most cited articles
In this newsletter, we present the 5 most cited articles from the ISES flagship publication, Solar Energy Journal.
1. A comprehensive comparison of different MPPT techniques for photovoltaic systems
2. Review of photovoltaic power forecasting
3. A support vector machine-firefly algorithm-based model for global solar radiation prediction
4. Tabulated values of the Shockley-Queisser limit for single junction solar cells
5. Review on polymer electrolyte in dye-sensitized solar cells (DSSCs)
Find more information on the Solar Energy journal and ways you can subscribe to it here – ISES members benefit from special discount rates!
Section News
ASES: Tiny Watts – A Big Tiny Community + Solar 2018 presentations available
ISES Section, the American Solar Energy Society (ASES) recently launched a new web-based platform to create a nationwide community of users of “tiny watts” – small solar PV and solar thermal applications such as solar backpacks; solar lights; solar cookers; low-tech solar water heaters, food dryers and much more. Participants can register their solar device, calculate how much solar energy is being used and “fall in love with the many uses of solar and become Solar Citizens.” Registered users can discover more product info, learn about watts, efficiency, available sunlight, hours of usage and find more do-it-yourself projects to make a solar difference.
The goal of this project is to achieve one million tiny watts all connected in the tiny watts community around the world to share knowledge about and a commitment to sustainable energy.
Find all information on Tiny Watts and register your device here.
All presentation from the 47th Annual National Solar Conference, SOLAR 2018, in Boulder Colorado are now publicly available online. More information and videos can be found on YouTube and the ASES homepage.
ISES Croatia – 11th “Days of Passive Houses” Conference
The ISES Section in Croatia announces the 11th “Days of Passive House” Conference which will be held from 9 – 11 November 2018 (in Croatian) , at the Faculty of Architecture, University in Zagreb.
Interest in the passive house concept (“A+” energy standard) and its global implementation is rapidlly rising, both in new buildings and in building renovaton, called “factor 10” rennovation.
The conference will address passive houses and classification as defined by the Passive House Institute, in Darmstadt, Germany. For more on the conference, please visit the conference homepage.