Riding through the Experience Curve for Solar Photovoltaics Systems in Germany

Abstract

Germany is a “mature” market for solar photovoltaics (PV) systems. The electricity production from renewables grew from around 6% in 2000 to nearly 36% in 2017. With the policy instrument feed-in-tariff, the PV installations boomed in the country over the past years, though the recent trend is in decline. Also in many other countries (e.g., China, Japan, etc.) solar PV installation is growing recently at a faster rate than many projected scenarios. It is seen as the next major energy regime in many countries. Hence it is necessary to model the future market growth and predict the further cost reductions under different scenarios of market dynamics. In this paper, using the experience curve model, the historical PV market trend is analyzed and results are used to predict the future of solar PV growth in German and global market, including its cost reduction potential. Also the solar PV policy of Germany has been discussed. As the results, the future PV growth scenarios are presented until 2030 for Germany and global cases. Based on the used experience curve model, the respective future price trends (2030 prices for German PV systems) are projected to be in a range from 250 to 500 €/kWp.