Dan Martin, Executive VP, Photovotaics

My job takes me around the world to see important solar constituencies from every segment of the industry. From Hamburg and Anaheim to Taiwan, Korea and India, I am fortunate to get a ringside seat to view the enormous progress this industry has made since 2004 when government policies, technology progress and fossil fuel prices helped push the world market over one gigawatt. Despite the global credit crisis and world recession, every facet of the solar ecosystem—including scientists, policy makers, environmental activists, cell and module manufacturers, equipment and materials suppliers, to name a few—are reaching critical milestones in growth, technical achievement, commercial reward, and policy success.

Despite this visible and tangible industry progress, for the first time in many years, there are storms clouds on the horizon threatening the continued growth and prosperity of the industry.

• In October, the National Renewable Energy Lab (NREL) confirmed the highest efficiency rating of a full sized solar panel of 20.4 percent by SunPower and a new efficiency milestone for CIGS on plastic substrates at 14% by Ascent Solar. Earlier, the Fraunhofer Institute set a new world record of 99.03 % for the efficiency of inverters. These, and many other developments, prove that technical progress will continue to move the industry.
• In the US, SolarTech announced significant progress in the turn-around time from purchase to permitting and interconnection in California, a critical metric to support the growth of this important market. Solar Alliance, a US advocacy group focusing on effective state policy, has acknowledged the effectiveness of feed-in tariffs and come out with good policy recommendations. At the federal level, the House has passed a strong bill supporting a number of key solar policies.
• SunTech Power has started building the first phase of a 50-MW PV power plant in eastern China's Jiangsu province, spurred in part by local feed-in tariffs. Beginning with China’s current “Golden Sun” program, by 2020 some analysts estimate that China’s installed solar capacity could grow to 10GW, and maybe as high as 20GW. In India, the National Solar Mission formally announced on Nov. 14, sets a target for 20GW of solar capacity by 2020.

These and many, many other announcements underscore the health of our industry, even during this historic economic recession, and point to a prosperous and exciting future.

• The change in German government has led many to believe that solar incentives will be scaled back sometime in the future. The new coalition recently announced it will seek talks with the solar-energy industry on possible “adjustments” to avoid “excessive subsidies”. In 2008, Spain and Germany represented nearly 70% of the world’s demand for PV. Last year, Spain’s incentives were dialed way back; a similar move by Germany would be devastating.
• It now looks certain that the US Senate will not pass a climate-change bill before the global summit next month in Copenhagen. With the US Congress immersed in an acrimonious health care debate, it is hard to see the passage of a strong solar component in a comprehensive energy bill in the current session. Meanwhile, at the state level where the real action is, feed-in tariffs still have not achieved strong support, even from solar advocates.
• Growing trade friction with China may intrude upon thoughtful policy discussions. Earlier this fall many European solar manufacturers accused Chinese firms of “dumping” below-cost solar panels on the market, and arguments that solar incentives result in subsidies for Chinese manufacturers are beginning to be heard.

The point of this glass-half-empty, half-filled discussion is that now more than ever the industry needs to work together effectively together to protect our progress, sustain the momentum, and aggressively reach new milestones in demand and cost reduction. A great majority of the industry already recognizes the need for effective collaboration. This week, for example, the PV Group announced results of an industry-wide survey that indicated that nearly 75% of the respondents see a need for greater collaboration among the entire manufacturing supply chain. Perhaps more revealing, the lack of collaboration in the industry was cited as the second leading barrier to industry growth (behind poor government policies).

Some of this lack of industry collaboration can be seen in the lack of strong, global industry standards, the lack of a common technology roadmap and wide-diversity of public policy options and opinions in the world today, many of which are ineffective or insufficient. Yes, our industry is young and we are just getting our act together. Standards efforts are getting underway throughout the world. Best practices in feed-in tariff programs and other policies are beginning to proliferate, and industry roadmap discussions are progressing in various quarters. But these efforts don’t match industry needs, and are not moving fast enough to let me sleep soundly at night.

At recent industry events like PVSEC in Germany, SPI in the US and SOLARCON India, a great sense of common purpose can be felt throughout show floor and conference rooms. Well-crafted speeches by government officials and industry leaders regularly call upon the angels of cooperation and collaboration to help move the industry forward. Those emotions and rhetoric need to be channeled into common effort directly focusing on cost reduction, open markets and sustainable, healthy growth. The global PV industry has indeed made significant progress, but there is so much more work to do, to which I’m sure we can all agree can be done more effectively.

SEMI PV Group

www.pvgroup.org

November 2009