Tuesday, 25 August 2026

Europe recorded its hottest June on record this summer during a run of repeated record-breaking heat waves, according to Canary Media.

Canary Media reported that a drought hit the continent at the same time, pulling rivers down to record lows. The outlet described the drought as possibly related to the heat.

River levels matter for power supply because thermal plants draw on river water for cooling, and hydro output depends on flow. Canary Media's account pairs the two stresses, heat and low water, as concurrent conditions across the continent.

By around 2060, Sweden's yearly stream of retired solar panels could reach 150,000 metric tons, against 17 metric tons in 2021, according to a circular-economy roadmap reported by pv magazine. Axfoundation and KTH Royal Institute of Technology authored the roadmap with industry partners, among them Svea Solar, El-Kretsen, Stena Recycling and REMONDIS.

RISE puts the 2060 figure inside a scenario band: 40,000 metric tons a year if deployment stays lower, 150,000 metric tons if expansion runs fast, with the heavier volumes starting to show up from around 2035, pv magazine reported.

Viability is the near-term problem. A dedicated photovoltaic (PV) recycling plant needs roughly 10,000 metric tons flowing in each year to work economically on RISE's estimate, and Sweden has not yet come close to that inflow.

Glass dominates what arrives. Roughly 67% of a typical panel is glass, 16% aluminum, 11% plastic and 4% silicon, per the roadmap. Each unit weighs about 20 kg.

Six of 12 European countries filing PV-specific treatment data hit the 85% recovery target in 2021, the European Environment Agency found, according to pv magazine.

The European Commission's Joint Research Centre estimates cumulative EU photovoltaic waste at between 21 million and 35 million metric tons by 2050.

One pilot process has pulled back more than 99.5% of a panel's original weight in testing, using electrohydraulic shockwave fragmentation and including routes for silicon and silver recovery, pv magazine reported.

Denmark's state-owned export bank has lent EUR 100 million to build a large new wind farm in Ukraine, Semafor Net Zero reported.

The project will run on turbines supplied by Danish manufacturer Vestas, according to Semafor Net Zero, and will be operated by Ukrainian agricultural company Kernal, which plans to use part of the output itself and sell the rest into the country's battered grid.

Peder Lundquist, chief executive of the Export and Investment Fund, told Semafor Net Zero that the fund assesses Ukrainian investments strictly on economic merits. "As a principle, we will ignore the fact that there is a war," Lundquist said.

That stance has not yet been tested by a direct hit. Of the several dozen projects the fund has backed in Ukraine since the 2022 invasion, spanning energy, agriculture and other sectors, none have sustained major damage from Russian attacks, Lundquist said.

The loan is not the fund's first bet on Ukrainian wind. Last year it made another major investment in a separate wind project alongside Ukrainian energy company DTEK, according to Semafor Net Zero.

The corporate owner of Solara4, a 220 MW solar plant in Portugal, has been placed into administration, pv magazine reported. Thin output, softer wholesale power prices, technical faults and higher costs cut into revenues and cash flow at Welink Energy Portugal 2 UK.

A document lodged with the UK's Companies House register dates the administration to 11 June 2026, pv magazine reported.

Sited at Alcoutim in southern Portugal, the plant started operating in 2021, and no larger solar facility existed in the country at that point, according to pv magazine.

The design called for output of roughly 382 GWh a year from 661,500 modules laid out over about 320 hectares of non-contiguous land, pv magazine reported.

Investec and Kommunalkredit Austria are the main creditors, with project exposure of some EUR 64 million, according to pv magazine.

A separate dispute has already reached the courts. China Triumph International Engineering sought GBP 17.2 million from the WeLink group in High Court proceedings last July, tied to unpaid debts on solar projects, pv magazine reported.

Exus has taken over management of the project from Welink Investments, pv magazine reported. Exus and Enertis are expected to review what capital is needed to restore and lift generation at the plant.