Analyst Blog
Smart Grid Tradeshows in Europe Shifting Focus
21 August 2012
Over the next few months, two key European smart grid conferences will take place: first the 2012 Cigre Session in Paris August 26-31 (http://www.cigre.org/Events/Session/Session-2012), then the Metering Billing/CRM/SmartGrids Europe event in Amsterdam October 9-11 (http://www.metering-europe.com/). These events highlight a changing focus within the European smart grid evolution, both in their materials and in the makeup of their sponsoring and exhibiting partners. While smart metering and renewable generation have been central topics in European smart grid development, these shows indicate a
USA Anti-Dumping Tariffs – What Will Change?
30 May 2012
The industry has now had a chance to take stock of the U.S. Department of Commerce’s announcement that it will impose an import tariff on PV cells, or PV modules that contain cells, manufactured in China. The preliminary findings of the anti-dumping case, which was initiated in October 2011 when a group of PV manufacturers led by Germany’s SolarWorld filed a trade complaint, revealed that a tariff of approximately 31% would be levied against a specified group of the largest Chinese cell manufacturers, and a rate of 249% against all other Chinese manufacturers. This was in addition to March’s
New Arrivals to the PV Inverter Market
11 April 2012
Inverter shipments reached an almost unbelievable 26 GW in 2011, according to preliminary results from IMS Research’s Quarterly PV Inverter Tracker. This impressive result for inverter shipments in 2011, which was an increase of 10 percent over 2010, came despite the large inventory overhang from the previous year.
However, although the industry saw a healthy increase in shipments, manufacturers were forced to make steep price discounts, particularly in Germany and especially for string inverters. This resulted in zero revenue growth for the industry in U.S. dollars and a slight drop in
PV Module Costs and Prices – What is Really Happening Now!?
03 February 2012
PV-Tech recently announced that its most read blog post of 2011 was an article from IMS Research entitled ‘PV Module Costs and Prices – What is Really Happening’ almost 18 months ago in August 2010 - over 4 months before 2011 had even started. This itself clearly says something about what the PV industry was talking about throughout all of last year, and still will be talking about in 2012.
Looking back now at the article I thought it would be interesting to revisit some of the predictions made versus reality, and what the future holds 12 months on.
Why Didn’t the PV Industry See 2011’s
UK Government on Solar Back Foot - Tariff Confusion continues
26 January 2012
The UK’s High Court today declared the Governments cuts to feed-in tariffs (FiTs) paid to owners of solar Photovoltaic (PV) systems illegal and reversed the cuts to payments to their original levels. This latest development is likely to cause further confusion amongst the industry and prevent homeowners and businesses from fully understanding the potential risks and rewards of installing their own solar PV systems.
When the UK’s FiT was first introduced in early 2010, it led to a slow, but steady increase in the number of PV systems being deployed in the country. The FiT payments
©2013 IHS. All Rights Reserved