How photovoltaic industry is paving the way for environmental protection

Janifha Evangeline

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Growing concerns regarding climate change, the ill effects of air pollution, energy security as well as energy access, coupled with volatile oil costs in the last decades have resulted to the need to manufacture & implement alternative, as well as low-carbon technology options like renewables. Solar Photovoltaic has been one among the pioneering renewable technologies during the last few decades. The total installed capacity of solar Photovoltaic reached four hundred and eighty Giga Watts globally excluding CSP by end of the year 2018. This represents the 2nd largest renewable electricity source after wind energy.

Under several circumstances, the photovoltaic modules that are mounted on building roofs can actually generate as much electricity as the building requires/consumes. A typical module will produce around two hundred kilowatt hours (AC)/sq. meter in a single year. Therefore, a collector area of twenty-five to fifty square is required to power a reasonably energy-efficient house. Such a house exports more electricity to the grid during the day when compared to the amount it imports during the night.

Issues in the industry

In recent days photovoltaic manufacturing capacity has increased far ahead of demand, and this has resulted in an intense price war & a wave of bankruptcies of high-profile Photovoltaic companies. Technological innovation has been squeezed by the requirement of enterprises to mainly focus on survival. As a profound industry shakeout as well as consolidation is underway, the winners will come as a trillion dollar/year industry.

The future of the solar photovoltaic sector is fueled by the basic equation where the Photovoltaic is little restricted or constrained by various factors such as environmental considerations, land requirements, material supply, security considerations, or anything apart from price & price is now or sooner will be competitive almost everywhere.

A changing market

The global solar market is dominated by

photovoltaic, & most of the Photovoltaic market across the globe is serviced by crystalline silicon solar cells. Until now Photovoltaic has found larger implementation in niche markets that include consumer electronics, remote area power supplies as well as satellites.

The road ahead

In spite of the growth of solar Photovoltaic & its bright future, the sun sets even on the best panels. while the global PV market starts to grow, there will be a need to eliminate the degradation of panels & managing the volume of decommissioned Photovoltaic panels. The framework of a circular economy coupled with the classic waste reduction principles like reduce, reuse & recycle can also be applied to Photovoltaic panels.

Reduce: material savings in PV panels
The best options for increasing the efficiency of panels by decreasing the amount of material implemented. While the mix of materials has not transformed to a greater extent, efficient mass manufacturing, as well as material substitutions & highly-efficient technologies have started to occur.

While research is moving towards decreasing the number of hazardous materials & reducing the amount of material/panel to save costs. Although the availability of Photovoltaic material is not a huge concern in the near term, the critical materials may impose limitations in the long term. Furthermore, higher prices will also enhance the economics of recycling activities & fuel the investment for highly efficient mining processes, that include extraction of metals that are used in the Photovoltaics production process. Research & Development for Photovoltaics is focusing more on decreasing or substituting several parts that are used for solar PV panels.

Augmenting solar photovoltaic deployment

Although energy transformation could bring positive overall socio-economic benefits at the global level, a deeper look at the regional level highlights how the benefits and costs of the transformation would impact various parts of the world differently. Such differences are due mainly to countries having different energy transition starting points, the depths, strengths and diversity of supply chains, the degree to which economies depend on fossil fuels, and different levels of national ambition and means of implementation.

Deployment policies

Solar Photovoltaics have been buttressed by a wide range of policy instruments. This support at a large scale has now traditionally been in the form of feed-in-tariffs, tax incentives & quotas as well as obligations. However, now it is moving towards auctions at a larger extent. The deployment policies comprise setting long-term, well-defined as well as stable solar Photovoltaic power targets for attracting investment, rendering long-term stability of policy instruments, as well as adapting policies to changing market conditions & deploying renewable energy auctions which achieve policy objectives etc.

While the market for residential application market is anticipated to register the highest Compound Annual Growth Rate, the factors bolstering the growth of this market consists of the declining cost of Photovoltaics systems over the last few years. The global photovoltaic market is anticipated to reach USD 113.1 billion by 2025.