The dynamics of solar PV costs and prices as a challenge for technology forecasting

By C. Candelise, Mark Winskel, R. Gross. 2013

218 citations recorded by the source corpus.

An effective energy technology strategy has to balance between setting a stable long term framework for innovation, while also responding to more immediate changes in technology cost and performance. Over the last decade, rather than a steady progression along an established learning curve, PV costs and prices have been volatile, with increases or plateaus followed by rapid reductions. The paper describes, and considers the causes of, recent changes in PV costs and prices at module and system level, both international trends and more place-specific contexts. It finds that both module and system costs and price trends have reflected multiple overlapping forces. Established forecasting methods – experience curves and engineering assessments – have limited ability to capture key learning effects behind recent PV cost and price trends: production scale effects, industrial re-organization and shakeouts, international trade practices and national market dynamics. These forces are likely to remain prominent aspect of technology learning effects in the foreseeable future – and so are in need of improved, more explicit representation in energy technology forecasting.

Subfields: Economics and Econometrics, Management Science and Operations Research, Renewable Energy, Sustainability and the Environment

View Paper: https://www.semanticscholar.org/paper/2ddfd0fb721fbadd64fc47fe91dbb506136ff086

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Citations in the corpus

Using the sun to decarbonize the power sector: The economic potential of photovoltaics and concentrating solar power ☆ (2014, background): “Although silicon shortages lead to temporary price increases between 2005 and 2010 [2], [3], PV has seen continual price decreases over the last 40 years, resulting in a price drop by more than 85% in the last 25 years [4].”
Evaluating the causes of cost reduction in photovoltaic modules (2018, unknown): “We analyze the costs starting in 1980, when space applications of PV were overtaken by terrestrial applications, which did not require as high quality and reliability (Candelise et al., 2013; Green, 2005; Nemet, 2006).”
What drives the profitability of household PV investments, self-consumption and self-sufficiency? (2017, background): “over recent years and storages can help to increase self-consumption and self-sufficiency, a growing share of the literature on self-consumption and self-sufficiency includes PV storage systems (Chatzivasileiadi et al. 2013; Vieira et al. 2017). In this context, Graebig et al. (2014) found that self”
Levelized cost of electricity for solar photovoltaic, battery and cogen hybrid systems (2016, background): “As the demand for PV installation continues to increase, the costs continue to decline feeding a virtuous cycle [14-19].”
Optimal subsidy estimation method using system dynamics and the real option model: Photovoltaic technology case (2015, background): “It has been shown that PV costs can be steadily reduced on account of R&D investments, process innovations, and capacity expansion [63]; a virtuous cycle, as shown in Fig.”