The Top 5 Solar Stories in November 2013

These are the top stories you can’t miss in November:

 1.      The Real Cost of New Nuclear And New Renewables

New nuclear plants are currently built in the UK. At the same time, people complain about the costs of the energy transition. Time to finally get some facts straight and to make the real costs of renewables and nuclear transparent. Check out the whole story from international blogger Craig Morris on Renewables International.

Credit: Thomas Gerke

2.      Why Corporations Like Microsoft Are Investing In Renewable Energy

Microsoft joins the growing ranks of firms – including Walmart, Google and Ikea – that are investing in renewable energy. Do these deals make good business sense? Find out why renewables are increasingly appealing to big businesses in this article from the Guardian.

 3.      Germany Leads The World In Solar And Gets As Much Sun As Alaska

Alaska, that state where Eskimos live in igloos, receives as much sunlight as Germany. What’s remarkable about this? Germany is the largest solar market in the world. It turns out that the sunniest and windiest places do not always have the most clean energy nor have the greatest impact on reducing greenhouse gases and health costs associated with pollution. Learn why it is 48% cheaper to install a watt of solar energy in Germany than in the US and what needs to be done to change this in this Mosaic article.

Germany leads world in solar, Credit: Mosaic

 4.      Renewable energy transition behind ‘remarkable’ slowdown in CO2 emissions

The increase in global carbon dioxide emissions slowed last year because of a shift towards renewable energy usage, a major new study claims. Find all the details in this PV Tech article.

 5.      Can Germany prime a price drop in battery storage systems, as it did for solar modules?

The German government has responded to the next big challenge in its energy transition — storing the output from the solar boom it has created — by doing exactly what it has successfully done to date: greasing the wheels of finance to bring down the cost of new technology. Check out this article  by Australian blogger Giles Parkinson to read about a German success story and the question: “can they do it again?”.

As renewables become an integral part of the energy mix around the world, you sometimes lose track of the global developments. Things change on a daily basis, articles are published almost every minute which is why we will recommend five stories you must read every month. They will vary from interesting comments to fascinating reports or images from the world of renewable energies.