ABB India has developed a solar-powered water pump for irrigating crops with rural India facing problems in the supply of electricity and availability of diesel for operating gensets.
“ABB solar pump drive starts automatically when there is enough sunshine and the motor connected to it begins to run the pump to draw water. At sunset, the drive turns off the motor and the water flow ceases,” Vinod Raina, senior Vice President (Transformers division) at ABB India, told reporters here.
He said that the built-in maximum power point tracking functionality enables the pump to run at maximum power using the available solar energy.
He said that switching from use of conventional energy or diesel gensets to solar power can free up as much as 18 per cent of the electricity that can be used for other purposes.
“As much as 18 per cent of the total electrical energy generated goes into agriculture. There are nine million diesel pump-sets in India. Even if 50 per cent of these are converted to solar powered pumps, it will save 25 billion litres of diesel per year,” Raina said while claiming that the implementation of the solar pump can improve agricultural productivity to at least two crops a year in most parts of the country.
The unreliable electricity supply in rural areas, the ABB official said, resulted not only in wastage of energy but also of water.
“Due to the uncertain power supply, pumps are kept switched on waiting for electricity and, often unattended, lead to water being drawn out and wasted,” he said.
Raina said that with the government having set a target of deploying 1,00,000 solar pumpsets over the next five years, states like Maharashtra, Rajasthan and Gujarat are key adopters followed closely by Karnataka and Andhra Pradesh.
PTI

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BenQ Solar Presents World's Lightest Mono-Crystalline Module for the Japanese Market
With the demand for high performance and cost-efficient residential solar solutions on the rise, BenQ Solar, the leading solar solution brand of AU Optronics, announced today that it has developed the world's lightest 60-cell crystalline-silicon module for the Japanese residential market.
To specially address the Japanese market, BenQ Solar has developed lightweight solar solutions which include an ultra-light mono-crystalline module weighing only 10.5 kg (5.3 kg/sqm), with the maximum power output at 280W. The module is approximately 45% lighter than conventional counterparts, making it the world's lightest among all 60-cell crystalline-silicon modules. It is safe to be installed even on thin metal-sheet roofs, which effectively reduces the risk of collapsing if an earthquake strikes.

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The winds of change have never been stronger, especially when it comes to meeting the world’s needs for clean, renewable energy as Siemens Gamesa has launched its new SG 14-222 DD offshore Direct Drive wind turbine with an unprecedented 14-megawatt (MW) capacity – reaching up to 15 MW using the company’s Power Boost function.

With a 222-meter diameter rotor, 108-meter long blades, and an astounding 39,000 m2 swept area, the newest Siemens Gamesa wind turbine stands tall in a world currently undergoing an enormous upheaval.

“We’ve gone bigger for the better,” states Markus Tacke, CEO of Siemens Gamesa Renewable Energy. “Safely and sustainably providing clean energy for our customers and society-at-large is at the core of all we do. The new SG 14-222 DD is a global product that allows all of us to take giant steps towards protecting and preserving our planet. We ourselves became carbon neutral in late 2019 and are on track towards meeting our long-term ambition of net-zero CO2 emissions by 2050. Our installed fleet of over 100 GW both offshore and onshore abates more than 260 million tons of CO2 emissions annually.”

The 14 MW capacity allows one SG 14-222 DD machine able to provide enough energy to power approximately 18,000 average European households every year. Approximately 30 SG 14-222 DD offshore wind turbines could furthermore cover the annual electricity consumption of Bilbao, Spain.

“Offshore is in our DNA,” states Andreas Nauen, CEO of the Siemens Gamesa Offshore Business Unit. “Since we helped create the offshore wind industry in 1991, we’ve been determined to safely increase operational performance, minimise technology risks, and create a consistently lower Levelised Cost of Energy. The SG 14-222 DD demonstrates our drive to lead the way in a world powered by clean energy. In fact, just one unit will avoid approx. 1.4 million tons of CO2 emissions compared to coal-fired power generation over the course of its projected 25-year lifetime,” he adds.

The 222-meter diameter rotor uses the new Siemens Gamesa B108 blades. As long as almost three Space Shuttles placed end-to-end, each 108-meter long IntegralBlade is cast in one piece using patented Siemens Gamesa blade technologies. Additionally, the turbine’s massive 39,000 m2 swept area is equivalent to approximately 5.5 standard football pitches. It allows the SG 14-222 DD to provide an increase of more than 25 percent in Annual Energy Production compared to the SG 11.0-200 DD offshore wind turbine.

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Researchers in Norway have succeeded in getting bacteria to power a fuel cell. The "fuel" used is wastewater, and the products of the process are purified water droplets and electricity.

This is an environmentally-friendly process for the purification of water derived from industrial processes and suchlike. It also generates small amounts of electricity – in practice enough to drive a small fan, a sensor or a light-emitting diode.
In the future, the researchers hope to scale up this energy generation to enable the same energy to be used to power the water purification process, which commonly consists of many stages, often involving mechanical and energy-demanding decontamination steps at its outset.
Nature's own generator
The biological fuel cell is powered by entirely natural processes – with the help of living microorganisms.
"In simple terms, this type of fuel cell works because the bacteria consume the waste materials found in the water", explains SINTEF researcher Luis Cesar Colmenares, who is running the project together with his colleague Roman Netzer. "As they eat, the bacteria produce electrons and protons. The voltage that arises between these particles generates energy that we can exploit. Since the waste in the wastewater (organic material) is consumed and thus removed, the water itself becomes purified", he says.

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