Since the escalation of the conflict between Russia and Ukraine, the European Union and the United States have imposed multiple rounds of sanctions on Russia, and have been running wildly on the road to "de-Russification" of energy. Photovoltaic, which has a short construction period and flexible application scenarios, has become the first choice for increasing local energy in Europe. With the support of policies such as REPowerEU, the demand for photovoltaics in Europe has shown explosive growth.
According to the latest report of the European Photovoltaic Association (SolarPower Europe), according to preliminary statistics, the new installed capacity of photovoltaics in the 27 EU countries in 2022 will be 41.4GW, compared with 28.1GW in 2021, a year-on-year increase of 47%. More than double that in 2020. The report believes that the EU photovoltaic market will continue to grow rapidly in the next few years. It is optimistic that the newly installed capacity in 2023 is expected to reach 68GW, and the newly installed capacity in 2026 will be close to 119GW.
According to the European Photovoltaic Association, the record PV market performance in 2022 has far exceeded expectations, 38% or 10GW higher than the association's forecast a year ago, and 16% or 5.5% higher than the optimistic scenario forecast made in December 2021. GW.
Germany is still the largest PV market in the EU, with a new installed capacity of 7.9GW in 2022, followed by Spain (7.5GW), Poland (4.9GW), the Netherlands (4GW) and France (2.7GW). Portugal and Sweden will replace Hungary and Austria among the top 10 markets. Germany and Spain will also become the leaders in the EU's PV growth in the next four years, adding 62.6GW and 51.2GW of installed capacity in 2023-2026, respectively.
The report emphasizes that, regardless of the intermediate forecast scenario or the optimistic forecast scenario, the cumulative photovoltaic installed capacity of EU countries in 2030 will far exceed the 2030 photovoltaic installed capacity target set by the European Commission's REPowerEU plan.
Labor shortage is the main bottleneck facing the European PV industry in the second half of 2022. The European Photovoltaic Association suggested that in order to ensure the sustained and stable growth of the EU photovoltaic market, it is necessary to significantly expand the number of installers, ensure regulatory stability, strengthen the transmission network, simplify administrative approval and build a stable and reliable supply chain.