The conference discussions were dominated by two themes: grid stability and bankability of PV. Some interesting claims that were made by the various market researchers, renewable energy financiers, and PV system technology experts:
- Estimates for 2010 new PV installations ranged from 15-17GW
- Estimates for 2011 new PV installations ranged from 17-20GW
- Upsides are emerging solar markets like Italy, India, Canada
- Risks include recently announced solar taxes in Czech Republic, reduction of feed in tariffs in Germany, mounting political pressure from traditional electrical utilities
- Prices for inverters are expected to go down, for a couple of reasons. 1) As PV module pricing rockets down, the portion of overall system cost related to inverters, mounting, and other BOS components goes up. This will get more and more scrutiny for future installations. 2) The component shortage last year resulted in many inverter manufacturers doubling or tripling their orders for lower level parts. As capacity increases and demand decreases, there may be an oversupply in the first half of 2011.
- With new PV installations growing so rapidly, the contribution of electricity to the grid from non traditional sources is going up. PV generation is more volatile and less predictable than fossil fuel power plants, and obviously varies throughout the day and the seasons. This variability can create instabilities in the grid, which was designed around old-school power plants. The impact is greatest on the low voltage network, where the majority of small scale residential inverters feed in. Inverters in the near future will need to support active and reactive power control to minimize potential grid disturbances from too much voltage being turned on or turned off too quickly.
- Estimates for 2010 new PV installations ranged from 15-17GW
- Estimates for 2011 new PV installations ranged from 17-20GW
- Upsides are emerging solar markets like Italy, India, Canada
- Risks include recently announced solar taxes in Czech Republic, reduction of feed in tariffs in Germany, mounting political pressure from traditional electrical utilities
- Prices for inverters are expected to go down, for a couple of reasons. 1) As PV module pricing rockets down, the portion of overall system cost related to inverters, mounting, and other BOS components goes up. This will get more and more scrutiny for future installations. 2) The component shortage last year resulted in many inverter manufacturers doubling or tripling their orders for lower level parts. As capacity increases and demand decreases, there may be an oversupply in the first half of 2011.
- With new PV installations growing so rapidly, the contribution of electricity to the grid from non traditional sources is going up. PV generation is more volatile and less predictable than fossil fuel power plants, and obviously varies throughout the day and the seasons. This variability can create instabilities in the grid, which was designed around old-school power plants. The impact is greatest on the low voltage network, where the majority of small scale residential inverters feed in. Inverters in the near future will need to support active and reactive power control to minimize potential grid disturbances from too much voltage being turned on or turned off too quickly.
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