Three major solar manufacturers are producing panels at full speed and contemplating plans to expand capacity to meet surging demand in Asia. Trina Solar Ltd., the third-largest panel producer, increased its forecast for panel shipments this year to as much as 2.4 gigawatts from an earlier range of 2 gigawatts to 2.1 gigawatts, according to a statement yesterday. That matches the Changzhou, China-based comp ...

A subsidiary of Hyflux has secured an agreement to develop a project in China’s Sichuan province. The Hejiang Fobao Yulanshan Mountain Wetlands project is expected to become a world-class ecological and environmentally-friendly development comprising residential, recreational, commercial and tourism components, media reports said. The agreement is valid for six months and was signed with Sichuan Hengxin Wei ...

Armstrong Asset Management has announced that it will commit US$30 million for solar PV and biogas projects in Southeast Asia. The company is pairing up with developer Annex Power on the projects in Thailand, Indonesia and Singapore. “We are delighted to be expanding on our strong relationship with the Armstrong Fund whose investment objectives align very well with our own and whose experience in the renewa ...

Mitsubishi Heavy Industries, Ltd. (MHI) has received a full-turnkey order for the construction of a 977MW (megawatt) gas turbine combined cycle (GTCC) power generation plant from Khanom Electricity Generating Co., Ltd. (KEGCO), an independent power producer (IPP) in Thailand. The plant is to comprise of two trains of a 488.5MW power generation unit, with both blocks slated to go on-stream in June 2016. MHI ...

The development of Mindanao as the palm oil capital of the Philippines has become the current focus of  the Mindanao Development Authority (MinDA). MinDA Chairman Luwalhati Antonino said the agency has initially identified close to 200,000 hectares of farmlands as suitable for oil-palm plantation. Negotiation for developing these areas is already under way. Antonino disclosed that several private companies ...

  The Union ministry of heavy industries and public enterprises has called for mandating only domestically manufactured power equipment for all future ultra mega power projects (UMPPs). And, for this to be made applicable for all future Case-2 bids — where the developer is expected to bid on the basis of specific fuel and location, where the specifics are provided by the central/state government callin ...

The state-owned electricity company, PT PLN, is soon to install 12 electric vehicle charging stations (SPLU) to provide accessible and reliable power to a fleet of electric and hybrid cars the government intends to deploy for the upcoming Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) Summit to be held in the Nusa Dua Resort complex in October. “The central government plans to prepare 20 or more electric or hybri ...

Korea Midland Power Corp., a local utility firm, said Monday that it has inked a 400 billion won (US$359 million) deal with two local shipping firms for the transportation of coals. Under the deal, Hyundai Merchant Marine Co. and the other local shipper will transport coals over the next 15 years to Korea Midland from Australia and Indonesia, starting from 2018. Korea Midland Power, a utility unit of the st ...

Siemens Energy has received an order from the U.S. public utility Portland General Electric for the supply and installation of 116 wind turbines. The wind turbines, each with a rating of 2.3 megawatts (MW) and a rotor diameter of 108 meters, are to be installed at the Tucannon River Wind Farm in the state of Washington. When it comes online in 2015, the wind farm's total capacity of 267 MW will be sufficien ...

Extensive hydropower development in the upper reaches of China's Yangtze River poses a threat to the future safety of Shanghai's water supply, says a new study. The report, by Yangtze River Fishery Resources Committee under the Ministry of Agriculture and World Wide Fund for Nature, known as WWF, is based on a scientific expedition by 32 researchers from government agencies and NGOs through five provincial ...