Global PV demand will not decline this year, and China's PV product exports will increase by 30%

* China's PV product exports may still grow by at least 30% this year

* Nuclear power accelerates exit, Europe or push new photovoltaic stimulation plan

* The decline in the price of the entire industry chain tightened the capital chain of photovoltaic battery companies

Author Li Ran

Reuters, Beijing, June 1 - The second quarter has seen a sharp decline in the installed capacity of European PV products since the second quarter. However, the head of China Chamber of Commerce predicts that as European subsidies policies become clear and nuclear power accelerates, there may be new ones. Photovoltaic stimulus policies have been introduced, and global PV demand will not decline this year, and China's PV product exports are expected to grow by more than 30% throughout the year.

Sun Guangbin, secretary-general of the China Solar Energy Photovoltaic Photovoltaic Subcommittee, said in an exclusive interview with Reuters on Tuesday that by 2011, some developed countries, especially Europe, had some changes in the photovoltaics policy, which led to a slowdown in demand growth, but it has been slowing for the whole year. The demand does not decline.

"Individuals believe that global demand can grow by 50% in 2011 and 30% by conservative estimates. The growth in demand is mainly from Europe." He said that US demand is also acceptable and policies are relatively stable. Each state also encourages the development of photovoltaics.

"China's PV product exports this year can grow by at least 30% or even higher than last year," he predicted.

According to iSupply, a world-renowned IT consultancy, the global demand for photovoltaics last year was 15.7GW, which was double the previous year. Last year, China's solar cell output exceeded 8GW (gigawatts), and companies are constantly expanding new production capacity. More than 95% of China's photovoltaic products are sold overseas. Last year, exports exceeded 30 billion US dollars.

After the nuclear crisis of Japan, countries have re-examined their plans for nuclear power development. The German Minister of the Environment, Lott, said earlier on Monday that the country will close all nuclear power plants by 2022 at the latest.

Sun Guangbin believes that countries such as Germany and Switzerland are expected to introduce new policies to stimulate photovoltaic development in the future. Although the subsidy rate for photovoltaic power generation in European countries has been lowered, new photovoltaic stimulus policies have been introduced, and China’s exports and globally Demand will continue to grow.

China's Suntech Power, Jinao, Yingli, Changzhou Tianhe and US First Solar shipped more than 1 GW each year last year, while polysilicon companies include GCL and others.

**Reduced demand in the near future led to tight corporate funding**

Due to the recent reduction in demand, the price cuts are transmitted from the downstream components to the upstream and downstream cells and polysilicon. According to the industry website PVinsights, the price of crystalline silicon photovoltaic modules as of May 25 fell to an average of 1.33 US dollars per watt, compared with 3 At the beginning of the month, the high level dropped by 17%, and the crystalline silicon cell wafer dropped by as much as 33% over the same period. The polysilicon technical barriers in the upper reaches were higher, but its price also dropped by about 21%.

With the reduction of the tender price and the reduction of subsidies, the global manufacturers have expanded their production to pursue lower production costs. Recently, the product backlog and payment delivery time have been extended, the procurement of raw materials has increased since the expansion, and the global commodity prices have increased. Under the influence of other factors, photovoltaic battery companies have been overwhelmed.

"Compared to some of the industry chain, multinational companies can still accept, but the current price for domestic SMEs has reached the point where the cost is not much difference." Sun Guangbin said.

Prior to this, Suntech Power expects a relatively low growth in shipments in the second quarter, with gross margins not changing much from the first quarter, while giants such as Trina Solar and Yingli expect gross margin to shrink in the second quarter.

Sun Guangbin revealed that three or four of the world's leading high-level photovoltaic battery companies have expressed great urgency and are in contact with the Bank of China, the Export-Import Bank, the National Development Bank, and others. "Even some of them are 20 billion, 30 billion, etc. **The project is talking. If the funding gap is not large, why should the listed company talk about domestic **?"

However, he said that SMEs have become an integral part of the industry chain and there is little possibility of a large number of bankruptcies. The vacant market share after production cuts may be quickly filled up by large companies that are eager to expand, so the industry will have an optimization. the process of.

Sun Guangbin also stated that the upstream polysilicon enterprises have high thresholds in the industry, and most of them are powerful companies. Because their profit margins are relatively better, these companies are also better than the photovoltaic manufacturers in the midstream and downstream. Finish)