Wood Mackenzie forecasts that newly installed PV capacity will reach approximately 270 GW throughout the world this year. This projected growth, if confirmed by final figures, will indicate a substantial 33% increase from 2022.
The research firm predicts a 1% year-on-year expansion in the global solar market for 2024, followed by a 5% increase in 2025. However, a potential decline of 1% is anticipated in 2026. Notably, the Asia-Pacific region, including China, is poised to dominate PV deployment until 2032.
Wood Mackenzie said that the remarkable escalation in China's manufacturing capacity is driving new solar installations to unprecedented heights.
“Massive expansion of manufacturing capacity in China is pushing solar installations to record levels,” WoodMackenzie said. “Developers are taking advantage of plummeting polysilicon prices to rapidly expand utility-scale solar plants despite increased curtailment risks.”
The report notes China's significant influence in the PV manufacturing landscape, and suggests that the nation might transition from exporting modules to focusing on upstream cells and wafers. The research notes that policy incentives for local PV manufacturing in the United States, Europe, and India are unlikely to significantly erode China's market share in the near future.
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Why would growth slow down when new factories manufacturing PV modules are being built all over the world? Where are the products that are going to be made by these factories going to go? Into unsold inventory? I don’t think so. These forecasts are somewhat similar to the ones that the IEA used to publish with flat or very modest increases year after year despite unrelenting strong growth. The strong growth will stop at some point but, why from 2024 onward?
Alan, your comparison with the IEA forecasts is spot on. Don’t take the predicitions from WoodMac seriously. They are becoming more and more unrealistic, if not ridiculous.
You are deluded if you think it will “slow down”
Instead it will continue to accelerate and disrupt the energy market in a few years