Asia-Pacific (APAC) countries, namely China, India, Japan and Australia, will continue to lead the global solar photovoltaic (PV) market over the next seven years due to abundant availability of solar energy and government support, GlobalData, a leading data and analytics company, said in a recent statement.
The company’s latest report Solar Photovoltaic (PV) Market, Update 2018 reveals that strong demand for PV in China, the U.S., India, Japan, Germany and Australia will drive global solar PV installations to cross 1,000 gigawatts (GW) of cumulative capacity by 2025.
'The average annual addition during 2010-2018 was 52 GW. Reduction in costs of PV due to an increase in competition, emergence of PV in new and upcoming countries in South America, the Middle East & Africa and APAC regions will drive the global solar PV installations during 2018-2030,' the report said and added that it expects the global solar PV market to reach 1,082 GW by 2025 and 1,516 GW by 2030.
APAC remains the leading region in the global solar PV market with a share of 58.3 percent in the global cumulative solar PV capacity in 2018, according to the report.
China, which is the largest market for PV in the world, has witnessed a declining trend in annual additions in 2018.
'The country’s annual additions are expected to decline in 2018 to around 42 GW from 53.1 GW in 2017,' the report stated.
Despite these declines, China is still the leading country in the PV sector after India, which is another key country in the APAC region as well as the global PV market.
India will continue to add record capacities each year during 2018-2022 in order to meet its aggressive national solar PV targets, the report showed.
India and Japan have taken up auctions to increase the market uptake for solar PV, leading to cost competitiveness, while encouraging state-owned distribution utilities.
The report said that auctions allow policymakers to control both the price and quantity of PV energy by providing stable revenue guarantees for project developers while ensuring that the renewable generation target is met more precisely.
'Against this backdrop, many new and emerging PV markets have taken up the auctions route to increase their PV market uptake,' the report underlined.
By Gulsen Cagatay
Anadolu Agency
energy@aa.com.tr