By Edurne Zoco, Ph.D, research director, solar and energy storage, IHS Markit
Highlights
- Annual global solar photovoltaic (PV) installations in 2019 are forecast to rise 18 percent, reaching 123 gigawatts (GW) in 2019.
- Two-thirds of the installed global PV generation capacity will come from outside China, with several new or revived country markets raising totals. Argentina, Egypt, South Africa, Spain and Vietnam together represent 7 percent of total installations in 2019, and 7 GW of total demand growth. PV is becoming more distributed geographically, with annual PV installations growing by more than 20 percent in 45 country markets.
- PV installations in the United States are projected to grow by 28 percent year-on-year, as developers seek to complete a share of their project pipelines before the December 2019 deadline for the 30 percent investment tax credit (ITC). An even larger share of the pipeline will only be partially initiated through module shipments in order to meet the safe harbor requirements that extend the 30 percent ITC if at least 5 percent of the components have been procured.
Our analysis
IHS Markit anticipates limited capacity announcements across the supply chain, which should contribute to higher average utilization rates across all nodes in 2019 and an improvement in the overcapacity situation faced by the PV manufacturing industry in the second half of 2018.
As anticipated, module prices collapsed in the second half of 2018, but existing strong demand outside of China – especially in Mexico, Vietnam, Spain – has slowed down price erosion for shipments in the first half of 2019. Many international developers have advanced their procurement, fearing that the upcoming new solar policy in China could affect module availability from tier-one players in the international market.
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Source: ihsmarkit
