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China has achieved a virtual monopoly in the world on the production of solar panels. According to experts, this carries risks for the transition of the whole world to green energy.
China pursued an industrial and innovation policy aimed at expanding the production and market of solar panels. He managed to significantly reduce production costs.
China has played an important role in reducing the cost of solar photovoltaic systems worldwide. As a result, photovoltaic solar energy has become the most affordable electricity generation technology in many parts of the world.
However, this has led to the fact that now all global solar supply chains are tied to China.
Over the past decade, global manufacturing capacity for solar panels has increasingly shifted from Europe, Japan and the US to China, which has become a leader in investment and innovation, according to the International Energy Agency. According to the report, China’s share in all key stages of solar panel production today exceeds 80%, and for key elements, including polysilicon and wafers, this share will rise to more than 95% in the coming years.
For the whole world, such a concentration is not beneficial.
High commodity prices and supply chain bottlenecks have driven solar panel prices up about 20% over the past year. These problems, especially evident in the market for polysilicon, a key material for making solar panels, are now leading to delays in the supply of solar photovoltaic systems around the world and rising prices.
The electricity-intensive production of photovoltaic solar panels today is mainly carried out at the expense of fossil fuels – after all, China heats with coal. But solar panels still only need to run for 4 to 8 months to offset their manufacturing emissions. This short payback period is comparable to the average lifetime of solar panels, which is 25 to 30 years.
The report notes that increased decarbonization of electricity supplies and greater diversification of supply chains should help reduce this footprint in the future.
“The level of geographic concentration in global supply chains poses potential challenges,” said IEA Executive Director Fatih Birol. “Accelerating the global transition to clean energy will place additional strain on these supply chains to meet rising demand.”
Achieving international energy and climate targets requires global deployment of solar PV to grow at an unprecedented rate. This, in turn, requires a significant additional expansion of production capacity. However, the agency is unsure about the world’s ability to quickly develop sustainable supply chains. For example, the annual addition of solar PV capacity to power systems around the world must more than quadruple by 2030 to meet the IEA’s target of zero emissions by 2050. Global production capacity for the key building blocks of solar panels – polysilicon, ingots, wafers, cells and modules – should more than double by 2030 compared to today’s level,
New solar PV manufacturing capacity in the global supply chain could attract $120 billion in investment by 2030, the agency said. And the solar photovoltaic sector could double the number of jobs to 1 million. The largest number of jobs will appear in the production of modules and cells.