Wednesday, 28 October 2026

Fifteen solar developers in Germany are pushing regulators to lift the auction price ceiling for ground-mounted projects starting in 2027, arguing that pending policy changes would squeeze the returns their installations earn, according to pv magazine.

The signatories include RWE, Enertrag, BayWa r.e., Belectric, Juwi, and GP Joule, pv magazine reported.

They want the ceiling for the 2027 auction rounds set no lower than EUR 70/MWh.

Their case rests on a Prognos study commissioned by the German Association of Energy and Water Industries (BDEW), which puts the combined effect of reworking the Renewable Energy Sources Act (EEG), the grid connection package, and the AgNes network charging system at a levelized cost of electricity increase of as much as 30% for ground-mounted solar.

The developers also point to a revenue squeeze from the business model itself: more frequent spells of negative wholesale prices and a planned move to two-sided contracts for difference would cut what projects collect, even when power prices run high.

Upcoming US gubernatorial elections could drive major shifts in state-level energy and environmental policy, according to Inside Climate News.

Going into the election, Republicans held governorships in 26 states and Democrats held 24, with 36 states carrying governor races on the ballot, Inside Climate News reported.

The outcome could set the stage for policy changes across the country, the outlet said.

Dylan Reed, managing director of Advanced Energy United, a trade association for renewable and low-carbon energy businesses, said the governor is the leading state office controlling the direction of energy policy and its effect on utility bills.

The Solar Energy Industries Association (SEIA) and Current Energy Group have published a whitepaper on how the United States could expand distributed energy resources, according to Solar Builder.

The report sets out three procurement pathways for distributed energy resources.

The first, programmatic tariff-based procurement, would let customers and third-party developers deploy distributed resources at scale through standalone programs, according to Solar Builder.

The remaining two shift toward market pricing: one pairs tariff-based procurement with competitive price discovery, while the other runs competitive solicitations based on requests for proposal, per Solar Builder.

Expensive gas in wholesale markets drove nearly 90% of the rise in UK household electricity bills since 2020, according to Carbon Brief.

The specialist outlet attributed the increase to a surge in wholesale costs linked to gas prices. Carbon Brief found that the same wholesale gas costs were behind 77% of the increase in UK household gas bills.

Across dual-fuel household energy bills, wholesale costs driven by expensive gas accounted for more than 80% of the rise since 2020, Carbon Brief reported.

Lawmakers in the US Senate are weighing legislation that would make environmental permitting faster for infrastructure projects, according to Common Dreams.

Writing in Common Dreams, the authors call the measure a handout to fossil fuel and data center developers, arguing it narrows how much say affected residents get as those projects grow.

Under the bill, the room for communities and for state, local, and tribal governments to contest fossil fuel and data center projects shrinks, the authors write.

One provision, Section 1202, pares back the authority that states and tribes now hold under the Clean Water Act to certify that federally permitted projects meet their own water quality standards, according to Common Dreams.

Maharashtra has waived the land transfer fee for renewable energy projects, according to the Economic Times. Revenue Minister Chandrashekhar Bawankule said the move would eliminate the additional financial burden on companies, help save project costs and give greater impetus to large investments in the green energy sector in Maharashtra.

The government stipulated that the land must be used exclusively for the development of renewable energy projects to qualify for the exemption.

According to the Times of India, if a company that benefits from the waiver later uses the land for residential, commercial or other purposes, or sells it to a third party, the exemption will be cancelled. The full transfer fee will then be recovered with interest.