Emerging economies: rapidly growing PV markets

This roadmap envisions a rapid growth of PV power throughout the world in OECD countries as well as in Asia, and at a later stage in Latin America and Africa. Major economies like China and India have become global solar forces in the past decade, and will remain important market influencers in the decades to come. The potential of PV for distributed generation is very substantial in Latin America and Africa. These world regions may become very important markets in the mid- to long-term. Brazil is a leading country in

the use of PV for rural electrification and can play a major role in technology collaboration with developing countries.

Brazil

The main applications of PV technology in Brazil are telecommunications (i.e. microwave repeater stations), rural electrification, water pumping and public lighting in low-income rural communities.

Grid-connected PV systems are still in an experimental stage, with a combined power of 22 kWp installed (Varella et al., 2009). In 1995, the Brazilian government launched a programme to promote rural electrification with PV systems, PRODEEM (Programme of Energy Development of States and

Municipalities). Approximately 9000 PV systems were installed in the period 1996-2001, with a total of 6 MWp of installed capacity.

In 2003, the federal government launched the programme Luz para Todos (Light for All), which aims to supply full electrification in the country by 2010.

The programme has an estimated total budget of about USD 2.6 billion funded by the federal government, concessionaires and state governments. A programme for labelling PV equipment and systems was launched in 2003 by INMETRO (Brazilian Institute for Metrology, Standardisation and Industrial Quality) to guarantee the quality of equipment acquired and installed within the Light for All programme.

This labelling scheme is currently in force and applies to PV modules, charge controllers, inverters and batteries and is done on a voluntary basis (Varella et al., 2008). The Brazilian PV market is currently dominated by multinationals, and there are no national manufacturers.

However, with the support of the government, the Brazilian Centre for Development of Solar PV Energy (CB-Solar), created in 2004, has developed a pilot plant to manufacture cost effective PV modules and silicon solar cells at scale (Moehlecke and Zanesco, 2007).

China

China’s solar PV industry has been growing rapidly and the country now ranks first in the world in exports of PV cells. Domestic output of PV cells expanded from less than 100 MW in 2005 to 2 GW in 2008, experiencing a 20-fold increase in just four years (Sicheng Wang, 2008). This is the result of a strong demand from the international PV market, especially from Germany and Japan.

However, the PV market demand in China remains small, with more than 95% of the country’s PV-cell products exported. In 2008, China’s cumulative PV installed capacity was 150 MW (National Energy Administration, 2009). Some 40% of this demand is met by independent PV power systems that supply electricity to remote districts not covered by the national grid. Market shares of solar PV for communications, industrial, and commercial uses have also increased.

BIPV systems, as well as large-scale PV installations in desert areas, are being encouraged by the Chinese government, which began providing a subsidy of RMB 20 (USD 2.93) per watt for BIPV projects in early 2009.

It is likely that the 2010 and 2020 national targets for solar PV (400 MW and 1 800 MW, respectively) announced in 2007 will be significantly increased. Experts predict that Chinese installed capacity could reach 1 GW in 2010 and 20 GW in 2020 (CREIA, 2009).

India

India has a large and diversified PV industry consisting of ten fully vertically integrated manufacturers making solar cells, solar panels and complete PV systems, and around 50 assemblers of various kinds.

Together, these companies supply around 200 MW per year of 30 different types of PV systems in three categories – rural, remote area and industrial. However, despite this strong industrial base, PV constitutes a small part of India’s installed power generation capacity, with 2.7 MW grid- connected systems and 1.9 MW stand-alone systems in 2008 (Banerjee, 2008). There have been a number of high-level government initiatives that have provided new momentum for PV deployment in India, including:

• The 2008 Action Plan on Climate Change included a "National Solar Mission" that establishes a target of generating 20 GW of electricity from solar energy by 2020; the programme aims to boost annual PV power generation to 1 000 MW by 2017.

• In 2008, the Ministry of New and Renewable Energy (MNRE) established a target of 50 MW of capacity by 2012 to be achieved through its Generation Based Incentives (GBI) programme. The GBI includes production incentives for large solar power plants of INR 12 (USD 0.25) per kWh for PV power for up to 50 MW of capacity, subject to a maximum 10 MW in any one state.

• The Eleventh Five-Year Plan (2007-12) proposed solar RD&D funding of INR 4 billion (86.4M USD). The Working Group on R&D for the Energy Sector proposed an additional INR 53 billion (1.15B USD) in RD&D for the Eleventh Five-Year Plan, with the two largest topics being:

Research on silicon production for PV manufacturing (total investment INR 12 billion [259M USD], including the establishment of a silicon production facility) and research on LEDs (INR 10 billion [216M USD], also including the establishment of a manufacturing facility).