Solar makes its mark on unsuspecting global energy markets

Here is an interesting fact: Solar PV is already upturning the business models of utilities around the world, yet right now it contributes just 1 per cent of global electricity demand. Imagine what its impact will be when it grows another tenfold in the coming decade.

In 2014, according to the International Energy Agency Photovoltaic Power System Programme (IEA PVPS) new document  Snapshot of Global PV Markets 2014, a total of 38.7GW of global PV capacity was added in 2014, just above 2013, as a steep decline in Europe was offset by sharp gains in Asia.

This took total capacity to 177GW, a tenfold increase since 2008. This total is expected to grow by nearly one-third in 2015.

In the coming decades, solar PV is forecast to make an even greater impact. Last year, the IEA updated its forecast to suggest that solar PV’s share of global electricity will reach 16 per cent by 2050, with around 4,600GW of installed PV capacity.

Even so, the IEA is still regarded as highly conservative on solar’s potential. Deutsche Bank expects solar to become a $5 trillion market by 2030, when its share of the global electricity market will have risen more than 10-fold as fossil fuels struggle to compete, particularly in new generation.

According to the latest data, already 19 countries around the world, including Australia, source more than 1 per cent of their electricity needs from solar PV.

In the first established markets in Europe, the totals reach more than 7 per cent in countries like Germany, Greece and Italy. Another nine countries, including Australia and Japan, source more than 2 per cent of their electricity needs from solar PV.

solar global penetration

Australia ranks in the top 10 markets for solar PV – both in installations in 2014, and for cumulative totals. What distinguishes Australia is that its market is almost totally rooftop solar – on households and businesses – while other major markets are more focused on large-scale solar.

China, Japan and the US dominate the market now, while Germany still leads on total capacity – although it could be overtaken by China in 2015, which has set a target of 17GW of new solar PV for the year.

solar country totals

This next graph seeks to illustrate the changing focus of global solar PV markets – Europe to Asia and the Americas. Asia accounted for nearly two-thirds of installations in 2014 and is expected to dominate again in 2015.

But a series of new markets are also emerging. The UK, France and Netherlands are still growing in Europe, even though the PV market in some countries has almost completely shut down.

The US market continues to grow, and reached 6.2GW in 2014. Canada and, to a lesser extent, Mexico are also progressing, and Chile has installed close to 400MW, becoming de facto the first PV country in South America. Brazil and Peru are following in its footsteps.

solar global cumulative

Comments

21 responses to “Solar makes its mark on unsuspecting global energy markets”

  1. Professor Ray Wills Avatar
    Professor Ray Wills

    Has anyone noticed the IEA numbers appear to be short by 8GW?

    Global installed capacity at 185 GW by my numbers.

    China has publicly stated they were over 30 GW installed prior to December 2014

    1. john Avatar
      john

      Ray I bet they are using old figures possibly early 2014.

      1. Reto Fassbind Avatar
        Reto Fassbind

        No they actually don’t use outdated figures and are certainly not missing 8 GW in their figures. They are using their 2013-cumulative figure published in the IEA-PVPS Trends 2014 report (released October 2014), and added their preliminary 2014 installations (38.7 GW), minus the 2 GW from China’ retroactive correction for 2013 (mentioned in Snapshot report on page 5).

        1. Cume by end of 2013 of 139,795 MW (IEA-PVPS Trends 2014 report)
        2. Installations in 2014 of 38,700 MW (IEA-PVPS Snapshot)
        3. Chinas retroactive correction of -1,970 MW for 2013
        4. This results in 176,525 MW or 177 GW (rounded) .

        The figures are consistent. This doesn’t mean however, that the 38.7 GW for 2014 are a good estimate. This is just the number of more or less confirmed installations with high level of confidence. The report says that the figure will likely increase to close to 40 GW. By the way, the sum of all 33 countries they listed separately is 38,585 MW. If you’d ask me, missing off-grid installations and the other 170 countries in the world that are not mentioned in the report, installed more than 115 MW.

        So, it’s rather a “chicken little” approach to report the minimal installed capacity. I expect good reporting to give me the “best” figure, not the “safest” (least controversial) one.

        IHS has, one the same day, reported an estimate of 44.2 GW for 2014.
        http://www.solarnews.es/2015/03/31/global-solar-installations-to-grow-by-30-to-reach-57-gw-in-2015/

        If it should turn out that the final capacity installations for 2014 is indeed above the 40 GW mark, then I will stop reading deployment figures in future IEA-PVPS snapshot reports. Why should I?

        1. Michaelinlondon1234 Avatar
          Michaelinlondon1234

          It has always been very hard to get the full figures.
          I tried in 2010. To many companies kept under wraps for commercial reasons the quantities they were manufacturing/installing. To be fair considering the difficulty in the field it is understandable.

          1. Reto Fassbind Avatar
            Reto Fassbind

            Well we’re talking about an intergovernmental organization, not individuals. I still think the IEA-PVPS does a “chicken little” approach, and that it could do way better, than the figures presented in the report. As I already wrote I expect good reporting to give me the “best” figure, not the “safest” (least controversial) one. Let’s see what EPIA has to say in its Global Market Outlook report due to be released by the end of May. By the way, “manufacturing/installing” is not the same thing, as production, shipment and installation have discrete quantities.

  2. Petra Liverani Avatar
    Petra Liverani

    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frank_Shuman

    I’m just posting this because I read about Frank Shuman (January 23, 1862 — April 28, 1918) today and I think his statements about solar are so very interesting considering they were made a century ago.

    We have proved the commercial profit of sun power in the tropics and have more particularly proved that after our stores of oil and coal are exhausted the human race can receive unlimited power from the rays of the sun.
    —Frank Shuman, New York Times, July 2, 1916

    “One thing I feel sure of… is that the human race must finally utilize direct sun power or revert to barbarism.”

  3. patb2009 Avatar
    patb2009

    I’d say the high growth rate is driving this change and that by 2020, the dramatic change will be obvious. Even getting over to 4% will drive that.

  4. Marcelo Avatar
    Marcelo

    Well done Europe! Right through the global financial crisis they were able to have the greatest growth in pv installations.

  5. Blind Freddy of Cairns Avatar
    Blind Freddy of Cairns

    16% by 2050! The fossil fuel suppliers must be shaking in their boots. Where will the other 84% come from, and by that time what will be the global demand for energy actually be! Even at a modest 2.5% growth rate, when China is predicting 7.5%, energy demands could be more than 200% bigger than today by 2050.

    1. Michaelinlondon1234 Avatar
      Michaelinlondon1234

      Population is going to nearly double by 2050 Almost no family planning in most countries especially Indian/ME/Africa, South america not far behind. A nuclear power station generates about 8 GW to put the solar totals in proportion. US has 125 nuclear power stations, Germany 20.
      Bottom line is we need as much power as we can make, We are going to need it for things like desalination plants Israel is already dependant on 25% of its water supply. A lot of the ME is going in the same way. I am puzzled as to how we upgrade deserts back in to farm Land. We know how to rebuild soils but no one is doing much on this.

      1. Ronald Brakels Avatar
        Ronald Brakels

        The middle of the road estimate is for world population to increase by about 27% by 2050. Just what it actually will be probably depends on whether or not the next version of “Angry Birds” is better than sex.

        1. Michaelinlondon1234 Avatar
          Michaelinlondon1234

          Not if those nutters from the medical profession and fake NGO’s have any thing to do with it. “Save the children” are just getting in to second gear. A woman can have 15 or 16 children in 20 years. And we are going to make sure they do and every one survives. 20 weeks premature…No problem. I am looking forward to the medical profession just skipping the whole process and harvesting eggs and sperm to really speed up humanities expansion.
          Population displaced (breeding) camps all across the sahel UN is looking for lots of money. Keep them all dumb and producing.

          1. Ronald Brakels Avatar
            Ronald Brakels

            Indeed. Imagine saving children’s lives. The gall of some people. Mind you, access to medical care has been improving for decades now and world population growth is now almost half of its peak around 1970, but it’s like Professor Suprapants Gnomeski always said to me in Medical School:

            1. Set up breeding camps
            2. Increase world population
            3 ??????
            4. Profit

          2. Michaelinlondon1234 Avatar
            Michaelinlondon1234

            My favourite storeys are of an African general complaining how after a decade or so of a war in a neighbouring country he marched home more soldiers than he had sent.
            Or the ex Nigerian police officer after going in to business for himself proudly boasting how he now has 4 wives and 40 children.
            As they say Keep on saving those children.
            You can feed them because I certainly am not.

          3. Michaelinlondon1234 Avatar
            Michaelinlondon1234

            By the way you should drill in to the stats of various countries.
            African, Middle eastern and south American. Afghanistan…40+years of war went from 15 million to 45 million.
            Saudi deported half a million Africans last year to make room for its own population increase. Israel is doing the same.

        1. Michaelinlondon1234 Avatar
          Michaelinlondon1234

          Malawi’s development is being thwarted by child undernutrition,
          the effects of which continue to blight the lives of 60% of the
          impoverished country’s adults and costing its economy hundreds of
          millions a year, according to a new study.
          http://www.theguardian.com/global-development/2015/may/13/malawi-child-undernutrition-lost-lives-poor-productivity.
          Now we could have been doing family planning and education with aid 60 years ago….Absolutely none until just recently. And it is still not high enough on the agenda.
          I have stopped giving to all the fake international NGO’s and only give to local charities now.

        2. Michaelinlondon1234 Avatar
          Michaelinlondon1234

          US budget for USAID 2016 …22.36 billion.
          http://www.usaid.gov/results-and-data/budget-spending
          US budget for bombing people around the world.
          $610.096 billion for 2013 This does not include NSA, pensions, FBI and DEA operations outside the US. Or the fake NGO’s the state department set up to push democracy down the throats of herdsmen and hunter gatherers in Africa.

      2. Reto Fassbind Avatar
        Reto Fassbind

        – Population will increase by 30% not 100% by 2050
        – The U.S has 99 operating reactors, and far less stations, not 125

        – Average reactor capacity is 1GW
        – Why mention Germany? They are phasing-out nuclear
        – In Europe there is an electricity oversupply, not scarcity
        – Israels solar PV growth is considerable
        You pretty much got everything wrong…

        1. Michaelinlondon1234 Avatar
          Michaelinlondon1234

          And which part of it takes energy to run a desalination plant did you miss? Re Israel.
          Germany is debating nuclear…It has not finished the debate.
          The US had 125 nuclear power stations?..I have no idea how many are still operational. If you say it is 99 ?
          I think your average is low.
          Regarding Electricity You need ideally 10%+ on top of peek need minimum. Europe has done a lot of work both on building efficiency and power generation, Still major work to do on storage and inter connect. There is at least 4 new nuclear power stations being built. There were gas turbines built in eastern Europe that still lie idle after completion. European grants….
          UK currently has a ten percent surplus. But the need is there to replace ageing nuclear with new.

    2. Reto Fassbind Avatar
      Reto Fassbind

      Hold on a second. “16% by 2050” is solar PV’s estimated contribution to global ELECTRICITY generation by 2050. You’re confusing electricity and energy. Never, ever do that again. In the 2050-estimate, the International Energy Agency, which has a very poor record of predicting deployment of renewables as it notoriously underestimates them, solar PV’s contribution in 16%. Another 11% comes from concentrated solar power, which is a different solar technology, and there are also other renewables, such as hydro power, biomass, wind, geothermal and so on, as well as non-renewable technologies such as nuclear power. So I really don’t know why you’re using an exclamation mark (instead of a question mark) when you wrote “Where will the other 84% come from”. Obviously you you need to get some thing straighten out first.

      As for the growth of global energy consumption, I’m not sure if China’s growth rate can be extrapolated to the rest of the world. At least have the courtesy to post an URL to support that claim, as I did with the with the “16% by 2050” figure below.

      http://www.iea.org/publications/freepublications/publication/TechnologyRoadmapSolarPhotovoltaicEnergy_2014edition.pdf

Get up to 3 quotes from pre-vetted solar (and battery) installers.