Home
The feed-in tariffs that propelled Germany into global leadership in solar power continue to show their effectiveness.
Despite a global economic recession that stunted solar installations around the world in the first half of the year, Germany will post record growth once again in 2009. According to BSW, Germany’s solar industry association, installed solar capacity could reach as high as 3 gigawatts before the new year.
Last year’s record for installed solar capacity of 1.6 GW has already been surpassed by the 2.5 GW installed this year. So what exactly spurred a sharp spike in photovoltaic (PV) installations in the latter half of the year? It comes down to three main contributors: a recovering economy, the fear that Angela Merkel’s government would scale down tariffs, and even existing feed-in tariffs that pay solar electricity producers more than retail prices for power generated.
It now appears that the German government will do little, if anything, to alter existing feed-in tariff laws, but the threat was enough to ignite a rush to get solar projects up and running as soon as possible. As originally planned, feed-in tariffs will decrease by 10 percent in 2010.
