Observations of a Non-Scientist about Sustainable Living, Renewable Energy and the Power of the Sun.

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WHEN SPIDERS UNITE THEY CAN TIE DOWN A LION.
-Ethiopian proverb

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“Earth provides enough to satisfy every man’s need, but not every man’s greed.”
- Mahatma Gandhi

Sunday, November 27, 2011

Renewable Energy:

Demand for solar power heats up as prices fall
By Sarah Murray

Manufacturers of solar panels had a difficult year, in the face of falling demand and a wave of cheap imports from China.

Solarbuzz, a consultancy, forecasts that growth in the global photovoltaic market will grow from
$46.3bn to almost $96bn by 2014. (http://www.solarbuzz.com/)

Even in the short term, healthy growth is expected, with IMS Research predicting global solar
photovoltaic installations will rise 24 per cent in 2011 to reach 24 gigawatts, up from 19 gigawatts in
2010.

(IMS Research - Electronics market research & consultancy www.imsresearch.com/)


While the fall in the cost of solar panels has been driven by a number of factors – including
economies of scale, increased efficiency of solar cells and technology advances – Chinese production has made a significant contribution to the price decline and China has been 
accused of unfairly subsidizing its solar industry.

Meanwhile, with analysts predicting the cost of solar panels will fall even further, the challenge for
European and US manufacturers is to come up with innovative products, such as thin film solar panels,
and to increase the efficiency of solar technology.

This is a really tough business environment and we will see some players leave the game, like Google's  recent announcement...




Source:

Copyright The Financial Times Limited 2011. You may share using our article tools.


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