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Solar-Electric Vision, Goals, and Targets...Our
Destination
"Our vision is to provide the electricity
consumer with competitive and environmentally friendly energy products
and services from a thriving United States-based solar-electric power
industry."
Our Vision and Mision
Our Vision recognizes that a sustainable market-based approach will be
required to achieve the Mission — to bring the energy security, environmental,
and economic benefits of solar-electric power to the United States —
by providing attractive products from a profitable industry. Coupled with
an aggressive market transformation strategy, our goal is to make solar-electric
power a significant component of the nation's energy portfolio within
the next two decades.
Our Strategy
We have four strategies for implementing the Vision:
- Maintain the U.S. industry's worldwide technological
leadership — Technological leadership is necessary both
for economic competitiveness and to become a significant contributor
to the nation's energy portfolio. Mounting foreign investments have
eroded U.S. market share on the business side and have overtaken our
R&D lead on the technology front. It is essential to strengthen
and expand our investments to secure our future. We must take our core
research, development, and other intellectual resources and integrate
them with U.S. industry's best interests — resulting in sound and
well-conceived programs and sustained investments that clearly support
and guide U.S. PV industry leadership worldwide. A critical element
of this effort is sustained partnerships between the U.S. solar-electric
industry and national laboratories and universities.
- Achieve economic competitiveness with conventional
technologies — During the past 25 years, the cost of photovoltaics
has come down by several orders of magnitude. Concurrently, our industry
has grown at average annualized rates of 15% to 20% — a growth
rate comparable to that of the semiconductor and computer industries.
Based on the actual cost of electricity at the point of use, current
PV systems are within a factor of 2 to 5 of conventional sources for
distributed applications (e.g., residential rooftops). Enormous markets
will be established for PV as its cost approaches that of conventional
technologies. Our roadmap charts a course that will provide competitive
power (i.e., costs of under $3 to $4 per peak watt) in a timeframe that
will ensure a competitive position.
- Maintain a sustained PV market with accompanying
production growth — Sustained growth in production capacity
and markets will establish solar electricity as a significant contributor
to the nation's energy portfolio, which consisted of about 825 gigawatts
¹ (GW) in 2000 of peak electrical generation capacity. Our expectation
for industry growth is 25% per year — a level that should be achievable
according to recent market data.² At this level of growth, domestic
PV capacity will approach 10% of U.S. peak generation by 2030. PV will
strongly impact AC distributed generation and DC value applications.
- Make the PV industry profitable and attractive
to investors — Our aggressive growth strategy will require
considerable private investment. Our industry must be profitable and
attractive to investors to earn their financial support. To grow into
a domestic business with an annual revenue of $10 to $15 billion, we
must establish strategic guidance and attract foundational funding now.
If our PV industry grows by 25% per year, cumulative installed solar
electric systems will grow substantially from 2000 levels of 75 peak megawatts
(MWp). U.S. generation capacity is projected to grow at 1% to 3% per year;
this incremental capacity addition is expected to be about 22 GW in 2020.
We project the following "endpoint" in 2020:
"The domestic photovoltaic industry will provide up to 15% (about
3,200 MWp , or 3.2 GWp) of new U.S. peak electricity generating capacity
expected to be required in 2020. Cumulative U.S. PV shipments will be
about 36 GWp at this time."
Our endpoint is important because we focus not only on replacing a fraction
of U.S. electricity generation, but also, on displacing the right
15%. PV will shave peak-load demand, when energy is most constrained and
expensive. Peak shaving alleviates the need to build new intra-city power
plants and transmission lines — projects that burden utility budgets
and typically meet with customer resistance. This critical long-term strategy
moves the load off the grid and handles peak loads at the point of consumer
use — true distributed generation.
If we do not focus on and develop U.S. markets — that is, if the
percentage of U.S. shipments to domestic and international markets remains
at the current level — then the 3.2 GWp goal in 2020 cannot be met.
Without this focus on domestic markets, as well as complementary activities
in the global marketplace, the United States' opportunity to serve its
citizens and its own national interests will be lost to foreign competition.
.
Non-domestic markets are significant and will continue to represent a
substantial portion of sales — especially in the near-term period
of the roadmap. However, the importance of PV technology to the interests
of the United States makes it imperative to focus on our domestic markets
as major targets for growth, sales, and consumer use.
Our Goals
We have categorized the specific goals for the roadmap in two major
industry target areas:
Total installed (annual) peak capacity— This
will be at about 7 GWp installed worldwide by our domestic PV industry
during 2020, of which 3.2 GWp will be used in domestic installations.
We estimate the mix of applications to be: 1/ 2 AC distributed generation,
1/ 3 DC and AC value applications, and 1/ 6 AC grid (wholesale) generation.
This expectation is based on business plans and market trend projections
of the PV industry, and published independent analyses.³
Installed volumes will continue to increase, exceeding 25 GWp of domestic
photovoltaics during 2030. In 2020, cumulative installed capacity in the
United States will be about 15 GWp , or about 20% of the 70 GWp expected
cumulative capacity worldwide.
Prices — The system price paid by the
end-user (including operating and maintenance costs) will be $3 to $4
per watt AC in 2010. Total manufacturing costs — or the cost to produce
the components in the system — are projected to be 50% to 60% of
the price of the installed system.
The success in 2020 of achieving the Vision and these goals will be a
hundredfold growth — over 2000 levels — in domestic markets
and the U.S. industry. Our roadmap sets the stage for further ramping
up of the use of this valuable renewable resource beyond 2020, providing
significant portions of U.S. and world electricity generation with an
environmentally clean, reliable, and competitive energy source.
1 IEA's World EnergyOutlook 2001, Executive Summary
(See www.eia.doe.gov/oiaf/aeo).
2 P. Maycock, PV News, February 2001.
3 Strategies Unlimited, "Photovoltaic
Five-Year Market Forecast 2000-2005" Report PM-48, April 2000; P.
Maycock, PV News, February 2001; proprietary report by Raymond James &
Associates, Equity Report, August 31, 2000.
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