In order to realize the REPowerEU action plan and the European Union's goal of reaching 30 GW of production capacity of its own PV equipment by 2030, it will be necessary to invest between 30 and 60 billion euros. This estimate was published in the last SolarPower Europe report, but along with it came the news that several European manufacturers of various equipment segments needed for solar installations have already announced significant investments to increase capacities.
In order for this ambitious plan to succeed, SolarPower Europe points out that it is necessary to facilitate financing and support European manufacturers not only in terms of CAPEX, as was the case until now, but also in terms of OPEX. The reasons for this lie in the fact that due to the lower electricity prices in China, producers there can offer a cheaper final product. Because of this, in the last 15 years, there has been a decline in production in the EU, in a large part of the PV segments. For example, European companies currently produce 9.2 GW of modules annually, only 2.8% of the total global market share (in 2010, it was 12.8%). In the coming period from 2024 to 2030, the plan is to raise that segment of PV production to 50 GW per year.
In 2021, with less than 1 GW in the global marker, producers in EU had a share of only 0.6% of cell manufacturing. Not even ten years earlier, Germany alone had a share of 6%. However, according to announcements, by 2030, production will rise to as much as 32 GW per year.
The production of polysilicon in the EU currently has a global share of 8%, and this is primarily due to the approximately 21 GW capacity of Germany's Wacker. With 70 GW of inverter power produced in the EU, the share in that segment currently hovers around 24%
The EU's strategic plan is to reach 600 GW of newly installed solar by 2030. When considering the fact that the global PV value chain has shifted outside of Europe and that most solar equipment today comes from Asia, there is an urgent need to take concrete steps to help EU manufacturers. In this sense, initiatives have already been launched in legislation and by setting certain conditions regarding sustainability and responsible business standards (ESG - environmental, social, governance) towards foreign equipment manufacturers.
On the other hand, it was also recognized the need for stronger financial support for producers from the EU. Through the Horizon Europe program from 2021 to 2027, the EU has allocated as much as 15 billion euros to research in the areas 'Climate, energy and mobility'. REPowerEU, through part of the EU Innovation Fund, in the last year has already doubled the financing of large PV projects with the amount of 3 billion euros. SolarPower Europe points out that for the revitalization of the European production of solar equipment and its achievement of the largest possible market share, it is necessary to create a Solar Manufacturing Bank whose primary goal would be to help manufacturers in the matter of easing the burden of operating costs (OPEX) that have been making their products too expensive for years compared to Asian competition. The war in Ukraine and the energy crisis that followed, according to the conclusion of this report, came as a wake-up call from the long winter sleep of European PV production.