Experts predict that by 2025, China's photovoltaic power generation will gradually become the main energy source
Experts predict that by 2025, China's photovoltaic power generation will gradually become the main energy sourceStarting from 2025, China's photovoltaic power generation will gradually become the main energy source." Cao Renxian, vice chairman of the China Power Supply Society and chairman of Yangzhou Darui Co., Ltd., stated at the meeting. The "SNEC2019 International Solar Photovoltaic and Smart Energy (Shanghai) Exhibition and Forum" opened in Shanghai on June 3, where experts focused on discussions about global photovoltaic development.
"2019 will be a milestone year in the history of photovoltaic development, and global photovoltaics will rapidly enter a new era of full grid parity." Gao Jifan, co-chairman of the Global Solar Council and chairman of the China Photovoltaic Industry Association, stated that with the release of domestic policies, the domestic market will see restorative growth. It is reported that on May 30, the National Energy Administration issued the "Notice on Relevant Matters Concerning the Construction of Wind Power and Photovoltaic Power Generation Projects in 2019," clearly prioritizing the promotion of grid-parity projects without subsidies, followed by competitive allocation for projects requiring state subsidies. This will be a significant transformation for the wind power and photovoltaic industries.
Due to the rapid decline in photovoltaic costs, overseas markets will see comprehensive growth in 2019, with the EU market recovering quickly, US market demand rebounding significantly from last year, and Southeast Asia, Latin America, the Middle East, and other countries and regions showing very strong development momentum. The trend of diversification in the photovoltaic market is becoming increasingly evident. It is expected that this year, the overseas market will grow significantly from 60GW last year to around 85GW.
At the same time, China's photovoltaic industry has still achieved good results against the backdrop of the "531" subsidy policy retreat last year. Gao Jifan introduced that on the manufacturing side, China's polysilicon production exceeded 250,000 tons, a year-on-year increase of over 3.3%; silicon wafer production reached 109GW, a year-on-year increase of 19.1%; cell production reached 87.2GW, a year-on-year increase of 21.1%; and module production was approximately 85.7GW, a year-on-year increase of 14.3%, ranking first in the world for 12 consecutive years.
On the application side, domestic installed capacity exceeded 44GW, maintaining China's position as the largest photovoltaic installation market for six consecutive years. China's cumulative installed capacity exceeded 147GW, by the end of last year, ranking first in the world for four consecutive years. At the same time, the national photovoltaic power generation and curtailment decreased by 1.8 billion kWh year-on-year, and the curtailment rate decreased by 2.8 percentage points, achieving a dual reduction in both curtailed electricity and curtailment rate.
It is worth noting that the development path of China's photovoltaic energy is not smooth, and there are still many problems. "At present, China's installed photovoltaic capacity is the world's largest, with statistics in 2018 reaching 140 million kilowatts. However, the matching between power generation and installed capacity is still insufficient." Zhong Jun, special vice chairman of the China Energy Research Society, stated that energy storage is a major issue that needs to be solved for new energy development, and energy storage is a reliable guarantee for the development of solar energy and clean energy. "At the same time, long-distance transmission and insufficient subsidies have led to high construction and operating costs. The key to solving these problems is energy storage technology," he said.
