The global floating photovoltaic market is expected to grow explosively.
With the global recovery of green energy, photovoltaic industry has become a hot topic. Fitch Solutions, an industry advisory body, recently released a report saying that with the strong support of governments, it is expected that the global new installed capacity of
floating PV will exceed 10 GW in the next five years.Then, that would be great news for
floating solar photovoltaic racks.
Great potential for the growth of installed capacity
According to the report, there are a total of 16
floating photovoltaic projects worldwide planned or under construction, with a total installed capacity of more than 11 GW. At the same time, many countries with the highest PV installed capacity in the world have started the pilot work of
floating PV projects, which has promoted the cost of
floating PV to continue to drop. Under the influence of the above multiple factors, it is expected that the total installed capacity of public utility scale
floating PV will show an explosive growth in the next few years.
In fact, studies by several institutions have shown that, from the perspective of available resources, the global development potential of
floating photovoltaic is considerable. According to a previous study by the National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL) of the U.S. Department of energy, if floating photovoltaic facilities are installed in all reservoirs of hydropower stations in the world, nearly half of the world's electricity demand will be met.
In addition, according to the latest research report issued by DNV GL, an industry research organization, the global existing hydropower stations' reservoir will bring about 4 terawatts of resource potential for floating photovoltaic.
Fitch Solutions analysts said that at present, there are many countries in the world in the layout of
floating photovoltaic facilities. Last year, the Netherlands launched the world's first offshore floating photovoltaic project. In July this year, Acciona, a Spanish public utility company, also announced that it would build the country's first floating photovoltaic project with a total installed capacity of 1.1 MW, and said that in the future, more large-scale floating photovoltaic facilities will be built in reservoirs of more hydropower stations in Spain.
Asian countries take the lead.
From a regional perspective, the report emphasizes that Asia will lead the development of the
global floating photovoltaic market. Fitch Solutions pointed out that most Asian countries with rapid development of photovoltaic industry have long coastline or large number of reservoirs, which has laid a good foundation for the development of floating photovoltaic. Many Asian countries have launched large-scale floating photovoltaic projects.
According to the report, 16 floating photovoltaic projects currently planned or under construction are located in 14 countries in Asian. Among them, China, South Korea, India, Thailand and Vietnam's floating photovoltaic market will perform "particularly well" in the next 10 years. "As the largest photovoltaic market in the world at present,
China's floating photovoltaic technology has a considerable development prospect. So far, there are many large-scale floating photovoltaic projects under construction, including the
320 MW floating photovoltaic project in Cixi, Hangzhou, and the 150 MW floating photovoltaic project in Anhui province. At the same time, South Korea is also planning to build a floating photovoltaic project with an installed capacity of 2.1 GW. "
The report also believes that Vietnam's
floating photovoltaic market is also worth looking forward to. "Although Vietnam has stepped up bidding for ground-based photovoltaic power stations, the electricity price of Vietnam's floating photovoltaic project is as high as 7.69 cents/kWh, which is attractive to investors," the report said.