MADRID: The number of Spaniards installing solar panels on their homes fell last year, the first decline since 2018 as subsidies wore off, but the outlook for this year is solid.
Analysts say that while enthusiasm for solar power has begun to wane across Europe as falling energy prices and inflation squeeze household budgets, the market for rooftop solar power is still relatively young in Spain. He said the impact was particularly significant.
Around 112,000 households in Spain will have solar energy installed in 2023, about half as many as in 2022, the highest level on record, according to renewables lobby group APPA.
Although Spain is one of the sunniest countries in Europe and a leader in renewable energy, it lags behind other countries in this field, especially Germany, Europe’s solar power leader.
Spain started to catch up after it abolished an unpopular levy known as the solar tax in 2018 as part of a plan to cut electricity bills. Charges for solar power generation have affected households and small businesses.
Christophe Ritz, market analyst at European industry association SolarPower Europe, said demand in Spain has fallen particularly sharply because the market is less mature and “more volatile due to external shocks”. Ta.
Madrid has earmarked more than 2 billion euros ($2.16 billion) from the European Union’s post-pandemic recovery fund for solar power installations, energy storage and the country’s renewable heating system. Additionally, many local governments offer solar panel tax breaks.
“The market in 2022 was doped with subsidies, the Ukraine war and market instability,” said Javier Dominguez, technical director of Spanish renewable energy systems company Cambio Energetico. “We had that hangover in 2023.”
Lucía Varela, self-consumption and energy community director at solar power industry group UNEF, said the market disruption and associated market turmoil has led to a decline in household demand as people no longer perceive energy prices as high as they did during the 2022 price shock. It was expected that demand would decline. Russia’s war against Ukraine.
However, she said the extent of the decline in residential installations is worrying for the industry, which may need to look more at new forms of installations that serve household groups and communities. Ta.
The industrial sector also reduced the number of solar PV installations in 2023, but the decline was smaller. Overall, about 1.9 gigawatts (GW) of capacity was added, his APPA figures show, 27% less than in 2022 but significantly ahead of 2021 performance.
play catch up
At the end of last year, Spain’s total installed rooftop solar capacity was one-fifth that of Germany and about half that of Italy, according to data from SolarPower Europe.
“The solar tax has set this sector back 15 years,” said Christopher Cedarskog, CEO of solar power supplier Sunhero.
He also said that delays in subsidy payments were hurting public perception of the sector.
The danger, he says, is that the poorest people who would benefit most from cheap energy feel unable to risk the initial costs.
According to APPA, the average cost of a domestic system is around 7,000 euros. Based on last year’s energy prices, he would be able to recoup these investments within seven years, even without government support.
UNEF’s Varela estimates that the average waiting time for grants is about a year, and in some cases nearly two years.
The Department of Energy is transferring funding to local governments to implement the plan, which must follow strict European Commission rules, a spokesperson said, with about 44% of the allocated funding It added that the expenditure had been made.
Maria Díaz Fernández, a 43-year-old primary school teacher, spent around 6,400 euros installing 10 solar panels on her home in Toledo, central Spain, in November. She said she is waiting for a grant that will cover 40% of the cost.
Her siblings, who installed the system nearly a year ago, were still waiting.
A bright future?
However, a Department of Energy spokesperson said the government’s performance on solar power was strong as it not only canceled the solar tax but also improved the regulatory framework, and the market has grown 14 times since 2018. he added.
John Macias, president of APPA’s prosumer division, is also optimistic, saying that Spain will continue to see growth as only 7% of Spanish single-family homes and 2% of businesses get their energy from their own solar panels. He said there is a possibility.
He predicted that this year’s installed capacity would be stable, similar to last year, and said Spain was on track to meet its 2030 target of 19 gigawatts (GW) of installed capacity in residential and corporate buildings. Ta. This goal equates to installing solar panels on more than 4 million average homes.
But some say changes are needed if Spain is to continue installing solar panels.
Around two-thirds of Spaniards live in apartment buildings, and many players in the sector argue that the future lies in solar panels in shared projects that supply energy to groups of consumers rather than single households. ing.
Such facilities represent 1% of the market and face challenges, not least cultural ones.
“Spaniards are used to consuming energy rather than producing it,” says Eugenio Garcia-Calderon, co-founder of the solar energy company Comunidad Solar.
