Solar PV at 92 GW brings half of global distributed power capacity

Jul 16, 2014 - The cumulative distributed solar photovoltaic (PV) capacity at the end of 2013 reached 92 GW and accounted for 48% of the total distributed power capacity globally, GlobalData said on Tuesday.

The solar sector is followed by combined heat and power with a 38% share of the distributed power segment and wind power with 13%, the research and consulting firm said.

Growth until recently was driven by subsidies for solar power introduced by some European Union (EU) member states, said GlobalData’s project manager for alternative energy Ankit Mathur. Thus, Europe is currently responsible for 66% of the world’s distributed solar PV capacity. However, the Asia-Pacific (APAC) region is expected to steal the leading position by 2019 as many countries in the EU have lowered their support, he added. By end-2019, the APAC region is forecast to account for 89 GW of the global distributed PV installed capacity, mainly thanks to China and Japan.

GlobalData expects the global distributed power generation market to expand to a cumulative 389 GW by 2019 from 190 GW in 2013, with annual investments seen to exceed USD 114 billion (EUR 84bn).

In 2013 about USD 74.8 billion were spent on solar PV distributed projects, which represented 77% of the total worldwide distributed power investment.

(USD 1.0 = EUR 0.738)

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