China Raises 2015 Installation Target to 21GW

By Kai Qiao, SEMI China

The latest version of China’s Five-Year-Plan for the PV industry reveals that China’s regulatory and planning body, The Chinese National Development and Reform Commission (NDRC), has raised its installation target to 21 GW by 2015.

China had originally aimed for 5GW of solar by 2015, but officials proposed a revision to 15GW last May as the fast decline of module prices made PV more attractive. The target number was raised to 21 GW - 4 times larger than the original number. The 21GW target marks the latest sign of strong support from Beijing. But some industry professionals have commented that although the number surpasses expectation, it is still relatively conservative.

“If the yearly new installations in one province increases to 0.1GW-0.2GW, then the countrywide the number per year will be 3GW-5GW, in this way, 21GW is not a big deal”, says one official from National Energy Administration. “The cost of domestic PV product is reducing rapidly. Currently the price is 70 cents/watt. In 2 to 3 years, it will reduce to 40-50 cents/watt”says one executive from GCL.

Set to Boom?

No matter how conservative the target looks, 21 GW is still a very positive sign and shows that the government has realized how competitive solar power can be. This guideline will further stimulate the rapid growth of China’s PV market from 2012 to 2015, according to reports from various market research firms.

With European demand set to shrink in the second half of 2012, China’s domestic market will become increasingly important. As China is now the world’s largest supplier of PV modules a quadrupled domestic installation goal for solar energy projects (to 21 GW by 2015) will help absorb the excess supply of panels and support prices. According to SEMI China’s study, the PV installation capacity in 2011 was 2.7GW, with a year-on-year growth 400%, making China the 3rd largest PV market globally. The new FIT policy issued last year also boosted the domestic PV application market. China’s latest move will help to support the huge amount of production capacity added by Chinese suppliers in the last two years by expanding domestic demand.

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Recently SEMI China organized a Xinjiang Desert Application Oriented PV Project Development Forum at August 2 in Hami city, Xinjiang China. Xinjiang is an emerging PV application market in China, the provincial government plan to setup 2.0GW PV power plant in next 4 years, and this goal may be increased as the price of PV module keep dropping down. Hami city has the best direct sun irradiation in Xinjiang. A series of hot topics as well as case study will be addressed at the forum, such as bankability of PV project, CPV technology and c-Si PV technology. Contact Mr.Kai Qiao at kqiao@semi.org for more details.

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