Affected by the keynote of photovoltaic policy and the market, the newly installed photovoltaic capacity in the first half of the year was less than 12 gigawatts, a decrease of more than 50%. However, overseas PV markets performed well, with about 47 gigawatts installed globally, exceeding market expectations.

According to the newly released policy indicators, the new installed capacity of this year is expected to exceed 40 gigawatts, which indicates that the second half of the photovoltaic market may show explosive growth. At the same time, the concentration of the industry is further improved, and the competition is changing to exploit potential applications.

In the seminar of "Photovoltaic Industry Development Review in the first half of 2019 and outlook in the second half of 2019" held recently, Wang Bohua, vice president and secretary general of China Photovoltaic Industry Association, said that in the first half of the year, China's newly added photovoltaic installed capacity decreased by more than 50%, the second half of the market may show explosive growth, which may cause the supply of parts of the industrial chain tightening, as the cost of photovoltaic power generation drops, Will stimulate the overseas market to diversify development.

Under the influence of PV policy and market, the newly installed PV capacity in the first half of this year was less than 12 gigawatts, a decrease of more than 50%. The newly installed PV capacity in centralized power stations was about 6.8 gigawatts, a decrease of 43.3%. About 4.6 gigawatts of new distributed PV installations were installed, down 61.7 percent year on year. At the same time, bidding accelerated the pace of subsidy decline.

According to the interpretation of the Notice on the Construction of wind power and photovoltaic power generation Projects in 2019 by the National Energy Administration, the scale of photovoltaic power generation construction this year will be about 50 million kW, and it is expected that the grid-connected installed capacity will be 40 million kW to 45 million kW within this year.

In contrast, the overseas PV market showed a bright performance in the first half, with about 47 gigawatts installed globally, exceeding market expectations. Indeed, overseas markets have been on the rise since last year. In 2018, about 106 gigawatts of new installations were installed globally, of which about 61.7 gigawatts were installed in overseas markets, up 26.2 percent year on year.

Driven by the overseas market, China's photovoltaic manufacturing sector continued to maintain a good growth trend in the first half of this year, with major manufacturers showing booming production and sales and basically maintaining full production. Among them, the output of polysilicon was 155,000 tons, up 8.4% year on year; Wafer production of 63 gigawatts, up 26% year on year; The output of battery sheet was 51 gigawatts, up 30.8% year on year; Component production was 47 gigawatts, up 11.9% from a year earlier.

In the first half of this year, the export value of photovoltaic products (silicon wafers, cells and modules) reached US $10.61 billion, up 31.7% year on year. Among them, the export of batteries increased significantly, the export volume exceeded the whole year of 2018; Component exports also rose sharply, nearly doubling year-on-year to about 36 gigawatts.

In terms of market performance, in the first half of the year, component export countries and regions developed diversified markets. There were 16 countries and regions with exports of more than $100 million, compared with only 12 in 2018. Ten countries and regions exported more than 1 gigawatt, up from four in 2018. At the same time, the European market has recovered significantly, and the export of components to the Netherlands, Spain, Ukraine, Portugal, Germany, Belgium and other major European countries has increased significantly.

Industry insiders said that leading manufacturing enterprises in the second half of the international market orders are sufficient, some enterprises have begun to selectively accept domestic orders.

In addition to the bright export performance, another obvious trend in the photovoltaic industry is further increasing concentration. Wang said industrial consolidation is advancing at a rapid pace, with less competitive enterprises accelerating their exit and large enterprises and state-owned enterprises accelerating their entry into the industry.

By the end of June, the number of polysilicon companies that have stopped production has reached 6, and the number of companies in production has been reduced to 18. Coupled with large-scale expansion of production by leading enterprises, the industrial concentration has been further improved. Silicon wafer, battery field "strong constant strong" pattern has been consolidated, small and medium-sized enterprises due to low capacity utilization, lack of cost advantage gradually lost competitiveness. On the component side, as the main market in the first half of the year is overseas, the backbone enterprises have obvious advantages in brand, technology, marketing, etc., small and medium-sized enterprises either become their OEM factories, or stop production for restructuring.

Wang Bohua believes that the domestic PV market is expected to resume growth in the second half of the year as the dust of parity Internet access, bidding project policy has settled. Coupled with the continued growth of overseas markets, the PV industry is expected to maintain a healthy development situation. At the same time, the scale and concentration of leading enterprises will be further improved, and the competition will shift from only reducing the cost of manufacturing to exploiting potential applications.

Tao Ye, deputy director of the Renewable Energy Development Center at the Energy Research Institute of the National Development and Reform Commission, said the newly released policy targets for the whole year are expected to be more than 40 gigawatts of new installations, with parity projects accounting for about 20% of the total. New installations are expected to reach 45GW to 50GW in 2020.

Meanwhile, overseas markets will remain strong. Global PV demand is expected to range from 123 gigawatts to 149 gigawatts this year, according to Bloomberg New Energy Finance. IHS, an international analyst, is similarly optimistic about the global PV market, which it expects to reach 123 gigawatts.