International Energy Agency

“A coordinated effort is needed to develop the solar thermal market in North America,” Lucio Mesquita, Head of Thermosol Consulting in Canada, said during his presentation about “Solar Cooling in North America” at the Intersolar North America in San Francisco in July.
Photo: Thermosol Consulting

This document, prepared by the International Energy Agency, comes as a follow-up of the 2006 seminar “Renewable heating and cooling – from RD&D to deployment technology and policy” aimed at exploring guidelines and policy initiatives to boost technology development and market deployment for renewable heating and cooling (REHC).

In 2008, the global solar thermal market grew by a significant 35%. The main reasons behind such a strong upward trend were the high growth rates of glazed water collectors in China (+35 %), Europe (+63 %) and North America (+42 %). Graphic: AEE Intec

The international harmonisation of norms is advancing: On behalf of operating agent Jan Erik Nielsen from Plan Energi, experts are working on the alignment of EN and ISO norms under Task 43 of the Solar Heating & Cooling Programme managed by the International Energy Agency.
Photo: ITW

Solar thermal professionals from all over the world will once again gather in Munich, Germany, to attend the international solar trade fair Intersolar 2010, which has just recently been renamed to Intersolar Europe. Its German organizer, the Solar Promotion GmbH, announced record-breaking registration figures of 1,700 exhibitors and 60,000 visitors.

One of the successful show cases of solar cooling applications in France: The vinery in Banyuls, in the south of France, where 130 m² of vacuum tube collectors supply an absorption chiller with 52 kW cooling capacity since 1991.
Photo: Tecsol

This was a study prepared by the International Energy Agency (IEA) in 2002. The study documented the collector areas previously installed in the 22 IEA member countries and to identify the contribution of solar plants to the supply of energy and how it cut down on CO2 emissions.

It has all the member countries listed with the total collector area, for different types of solar thermal systems, with energy savings equivalent.

This short document, produced by the International Energy Agency, provides a summary of the solar heating and cooling situation in 2009.

The document is divided in different sections: market status; economics; outlook; system related aspects; environmental impact; technology status development; which touch upon different issues ranging from the installed capacity, to solar resources of different countries, drivers and barriers for growth, etc.

At the request of the US Solar Rating & Certification Corporation (SRCC), the International Energy Agency’s Solar Heating and Cooling Programme (SHC) formed Task 43, the “Solar Rating and Certification Procedure”.
Photo: IEA SHC

This document describes the advancement of the Solar Heating & Cooling (SHC) Programme by the International Energy Agency in 2007. This report starts out identifying main barriers that stand in the way for advancing solar thermal technologies and the key areas to focus on for improvement: education of users and decision makers; expansion of the solar thermal market; research, development and testing of hardware, materials and designs.