On March 30, 2023, at a webinar hosted by Sobi English and sponsored by JA Solar, Josefin Berg, Manager of Clean Energy Technology Research and Analysis of S&P Global Commodities, Sun Jie, Senior Manager of Product Promotion of JA Solar, and German Investment Manuel Rodriguez, Procurement Director of the company Aquila Capital, gathered online to discuss the opportunities and challenges of the Spanish photovoltaic market, and highlighted the supply chain challenges brought about by the large-scale approval of photovoltaic projects in Spain.

Josefin Berg gave a comprehensive overview of the development status of the Spanish photovoltaic market. The country's photovoltaic market has experienced rapid development. In the past few years, the installation of photovoltaics has increased significantly. She attributes this rapid growth to policies, enterprises and households and other factors, as well as government support for self-consumption and distributed generation projects.

She emphasized that due to the impact of high electricity prices, the proportion of distributed projects in the Spanish market has gradually increased. She predicted that in the next few years, the installed capacity of large power plants and distributed projects will continue to grow. However, compared to the entire European market, Spain is still a market dominated by large power plants.

Sun Jie, Senior Product Promotion Manager of JA Solar, introduced the technical characteristics and value of JA Solar’s Deep Blue series modules. He said that the Deep Blue4.0X module will be released in May 2022, and it is a high-performance module with multiple advanced technologies. The module uses n-type Bycium+ cells, which have lower attenuation, better temperature coefficient, bifaciality and low-light power generation performance, and excellent reliability. The efficiency of this module can reach 22.4%, leading the industry and helping customers reduce the cost of electricity.

Sun Jie also introduced the current development status and future trends of battery and module technology, emphasizing the importance of stable, reliable and high-efficiency modules in reducing the cost of electricity. In his speech, Manuel Rodriguez, purchasing director of Aquila Capital, a German investment company, highlighted the challenges faced by the Spanish PV industry. He focused on supply chain bottlenecks and the impact of a large number of PV projects passing environmental permits, which he noted would lead to a surge in demand from contractors, suppliers and other key players in the market. He estimates that there are around 30 to 50GW of PV projects that have received environmental permits, and he expects a boom in installations in late 2023 and early 2024.

This was also confirmed in a presentation by Josefin, who mentioned that at least 30GW of projects have received favorable environmental impact statements. In addition to this, there are at least 40GW of projects in the planning stage in the country, and the future development of these projects remains to be seen, because there are still many uncertainties.

To address the supply chain challenges posed by the large number of project approvals, Manuel stresses the importance of building long-term relationships with suppliers and involving them fully and transparently from the outset. He also highlighted prioritizing quality and sustainability in supply chains, especially during times of supply chain stress. However, despite many challenges and uncertainties in the Spanish market, the guests were still optimistic about the future prospects of the Spanish PV market. Josefin said that although there are many challenges, there will be supply bottlenecks, but this will not hinder the growth of PV in Spain. We know that 50GW will not be installed in the next 2 years, but Spain will still be one of the largest markets in Europe in the next few years.Editor/XingWentao