One month after revealing plans for a big solar project at its new data farm in North Carolina, Apple has opened the kimono a bit more to show the project's planned output, ready date, and one of the key partners.

A half-dozen firms are promoting thin-film solar PV's "social, economic and environmental benefits." Silicon need not apply.

Another facet to the solar sector's ongoing consolidation: Solon has agreed to be bought by Microsol, a solar cell manufacturer based in the United Arab Emirates (UAE), for an undisclosed amount.

New benchmarks are still far from commercial power generation, but consumer apps are a low-hanging fruit.

As the solar photovoltaic (PV) industry plows through the current consolidation, here's a list of things to understand and remember about pricing, costs, markets, and just getting along.

Australia's Solar Flagships program was meant to pave the way for large-scale solar power development, but recent problems illustrate why the market has moved on without it.

First Solar's (FSLR) fiscal 4Q11 and 2011 results came with a couple of unexpected surprises -- including a big nasty one related to performance issues -- and industry watchers are raising their voices calling for what could be a radical shift in the company's business.

Try not to act surprised that the familiar Chinese suppliers still sit atop the list of solar PV module shipments in 2011, though one is making a stronger push to keep up with the others.

The latest quarterly financial updates now coming in provide a clearer view of the solar PV supplier landscape. Here's what the top Chinese PV module suppliers are saying, and what the analysts are taking away.

Severe and sudden changes to Germany's feed-in tariff program cause 'sturm und drang,' but aim for higher goals.

China's Ministry of Industry and Information Technology has posted a plan that calls for certain polysilicon producers to reach 50,000 tons of annual production capacity by 2015, and for solar cell makers to reach 5GW of annual capacity by the same time frame.

Following an unexpectedly giant surge in solar capacity, German leaders have announced the most seere wave of subsidy cuts since the government began supporting solar energy nearly a decade ago.

New Energy Technologies and NREL say they have created a working organic photovoltaic (OPV) module 170-sq-cm in size, 14x larger than previous NREL-made OPV devices, on a glass substrate.

Prices for crystalline-silicon (c-Si) solar photovoltaic (PV) modules fell below the $1/W mark in January 2012, and in some cases well below even that, marking the first time that global average prices have fallen below this milestone, according to IMS Research.

After a punishing 2011 and expectations of a tough 2012, there will be a surge of demand for upgrading solar photovoltaic (PV) manufacturing equipment over the next few years, says IMS Research.

Downward price pressure has haunted the solar industry from the outset -- but cost and efficiency improvements, and reasonable margins, are needed at all levels of the value chain. Paula Mints explains why the lure of grid parity need to change.

2011 was a rough year for the solar industry, leading into a 2012 solar winter of discontent -- but spring and a glorious summer are coming, says Paula Mints.

A new partnership between Suntech and DuPont will focus on backsheet materials that protect solar panels, their construction and how that affects their longevity, and how backsheets might even improve the module's power output.

Miasolé says it has created a 17.3 percent "champion" thin-film copper-indium-gallium-selenide (CIGS) solar photovoltaic device, and has started making 14 percent efficient modules in production.