On November 7th, 2011 Solarbuzz Inc. (San Francisco, California, U.S.) announced that China's non-residential solar photovoltaic (PV) project pipeline has grown to 16 GW at the end of October 2011, and also predicted that the nation will install 1.8 GW of PV in 2011.

Solarbuzz states that this increase is due to falling PV module and balance of systems prices, which it says has significantly improved internal rates of returns for projects. The company notes that expected installed capacities in 2011 are roughly the same as the United States.

“China’s FIT rates - 1.15 CNY/kWh in 2011 and 1.0 CNY/kWh for 2012 - used to be considered so low that project development activities have been mostly limited to high solar radiation regions such as Golmud,” said Solarbuzz Analyst Ray Lian.

 “However, system prices fell so fast in 2011 that project profitability has been improved to reasonable levels in other locations.”

Majority of PV capacity under development in Northwest

Solarbuzz's estimates and predictions come from the latest version of its "China Deal Tracker" report. The report identifies 1,104 non-residential PV projects in China that are installed, being installed or are under development.

These projects span 29 provinces, with Qinghai, Gansu, Ningxia and Inner Mongolia leading in terms of total capacities. 54% of projects identified, by capacity, are located in the nation's Northwest region.

State-owned enterprises dominate project development

Seven project developer groups account for nearly 1 GW of PV demand in 2011, including state-owned enterprises China Power Investment Corporation, China Guodian Corporation, China Huadian Corporation, China Guangdong Nuclear Power Holding Corporation, China Energy Conservation and Environmental Protection Group.

Solarbuzz notes that only one private developer, the CHINT Group, is numbered in the top seven.

The company further notes that in the current project pipeline, building-mounted projects account for around 10% of total capacity.

Finally, Solarbuzz states that if system prices continue to fall, PV electricity generation will become economic for self-consumption by industrial and commercial users in some provinces as soon as 2013.

2011-11-08| Courtesy: Solarbuzz Inc. | solarserver.com © Heindl Server GmbH

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