PV cost analysis in the Japanese PV market

Since the start of the Feed-in Tariff Program in July 2012, the PV market in Japan has been growing and annual installed capacity reached 9 GW level in 2014. It is expected that cumulative PV installed capacity as of the end of year 2015 reach 33GW with newly additional capacity of 10 GW. The FIT program was introduced for aiming to lead cost reduction of PV systems. However, The Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry (METI) decided to change the rules of setting the FIT level since METI concluded that the current framework of the FIT program was not fully contributed to the advancement of cost reduction. This paper analyses the status of PV system cost trends including soft cost and consider impacts of the proposed revision of the FIT program on cost structures.