The Japanese market is undoubtedly an important player for 2013. During the PVforum 2013 hosted by EnergyTrend, Brian Chen, Vice Director of President Office for Eversol, gave an analysis on the Japanese market. Chen pointed out that according to estimations by research organizations, Japanese PV accumulated installation capacity by 2017 will reach 33.6GW, a growth of five times 2012 installation capacity. With acceptability of Taiwanese manufacturers by Japanese manufacturers being equally high, Taiwanese manufacturers hope to receive benefits from the increase.
Trendforce held the PVforum 2013 Asian PV Market Status and Future Trend Conference on October 31st 2013 with Chen in attendance. Sharing the current status of the Japanese PV market, Chen pointed out that according to data compiled by research organizations, 2013 global PV market installation number are about 35GW and will increase to 41GW capacity by 2014, an annual growth of 17 percent. Japanese market in the 1H13 has already became the second biggest market next to China market.
Accumulated installation capacity for the Japanese market by 2017 will reach 33.6GW, five times higher than in 2012. Japanese market growth can bring opportunity for Taiwanese manufactures. Chen pointed out that with strong PV cell manufacturing capabilities and receiving high acceptability by Japanese manufactures, brings more opportunities for Taiwanese manufacturers. Due to the difference between most Japanese residences using 5 inch mono-si cells compared with 6 inch mono-si cells produced by Taiwanese manufacturers gives Taiwanese manufacturers more opportunities to break into the Japanese non-residentialmarket.
During the 1H13 the Japanese market reached 3.38GW in installation capacity, said Chen, already surpassing 2012 capacity of 2.47GW making it the second largest market globally. The Japanese residential application market showed steady growth in 1Q13 and 2Q13. In comparison, the commercial application market driven by subsidies experienced exponential growth. Starting from 1Q13, the commercial application market capacity surpassed 1GW.
However, Chen also mentioned that only 10.7% of the power plants completed gird-connection and has sold the electricity generated to power companies. Among these, from July 2012 to June 2013, 19.8GW was applied for commercially use but only 2.1GW was actually used. Reasons for postponement of construction include module supply not meeting demand, expecting drop in cost of components, conflicting land applications, unapproved land agreement applications, and intention of reselling the PPA. Therefore the Japanese government will possibly increase speed in reducing FiTand is estimated to adjust the rates every half year.
Looking back on the residential application market, Chen mentioned that it received the J-PEC subsidy and demands were stable. However, due to users requiring to purchase the entire set in order to install PV systems into existing buildings, current intake yield is only 5% leaving the market with a large area for potential growth.
