The U.S. government will announce $7 billion in grants for residential solar projects that will power more than 900,000 homes in low- and moderate-income communities in the United States.     President Joe Biden made the announcement on April 22 to celebrate Earth Day 2024.   The White House said Biden will announce $7 billion in grants through the Environmental Protection Agency's Solar for All grant competition, a key component of the Inflation Reduction Act's $27 billion greenhouse gas reduction fund.   Recipients of the grants will serve every U.S. state and territory by developing "long-term" solar projects to provide residential solar to approximately 1 million homes in low-income and disadvantaged communities.   The U.S. government estimates that the program will save more than $350 million in electricity bills annually, equivalent to $400 per household.   The plan will also be part of the U.S. government's goal to direct 40% of federal clean energy investment proceeds to disadvantaged communities.   Between 2012 and 2022, U.S. rooftop solar capacity increased tenfold, with small solar power generation growing rapidly from 5,959 GWh in 2012 to 61,281 GWh in 2022, driven by the rapid spread of home installations.   In 2022, residential solar systems will generate 39,510 GWh, accounting for 64% of the electricity generated by small solar installations in the United States, while commercial solar systems will generate a total of 17,724 GWh.   Although the growth in rooftop solar generation accounts for only 1.5% of all electricity consumption in the United States, at 2022 demand levels, rooftop solar generation could generate electricity equivalent to about 45% of all electricity sales nationwide.

According to the Institute of Renewable Energy (IEO), a Polish research organization, Poland's cumulative installed photovoltaic capacity has exceeded 17GW by the end of 2023.     As of the end of December 2023, Poland's cumulative installed photovoltaic capacity reached 17,057 MW, ranking first among all renewable energy sources. This is followed by wind power (9428MW) and hydropower (979MW).   Poland’s newly installed photovoltaic capacity reached 4.6GW last year. IEO calculated this number based on another study released in May 2023. As of the end of 2022, Poland's cumulative installed photovoltaic capacity exceeded 12.4GW.   In recent years, Poland's installed photovoltaic capacity has continued to grow. According to IEO data, as of the end of the third quarter of 2023, the number of photovoltaic projects in Poland that have been approved for grid connection reached 18GW.   IEO said that as of the third quarter of 2023, a total of 6,929 projects have obtained grid connection permissions. Compared with the information at the end of the first quarter of 2023 in the previous database, the number of projects increased by 41% and the total power generation increased by 46%.   Recently, Polish transmission system operator Polskie Sieci Elektroenergetyczne (PSE) announced a plan to invest 64 billion zlotys ($16 billion) in new transmission lines by 2034.   In its new draft development plan for 2025-2034, the Polish transmission system operator plans to add more than 4,800 kilometers of 400kV lines to upgrade the Polish power grid and add 45GW of photovoltaic capacity to the grid by 2034, of which large-scale ground-mounted photovoltaic is about is 20GW, and rooftop PV is about 25GW.   In its updated national energy and climate plan, Poland aims to have 29.3GW of installed PV capacity by 2030, 22GW more than the previous version of the national energy and climate plan submitted in 2019.

In 2023, Europe's installed energy storage capacity will exceed 10GW for the first time.     LCP Delta and the European Energy Storage Association released the eighth European Energy Storage Market Monitor last week. The report shows that throughout last year, Europe (including EU and non-EU countries) installed a total of approximately 10.1GW in household, large-scale ground projects and industrial and commercial markets.   This is more than double the European record of 4.5GW in 2022, and is far higher than LCP Delta’s expectation of 6GW in 2023 in the seventh "European Energy Storage Market Monitor Report" released this time last year. LCP Delta said the “impressive results” were driven by a combination of support programs and improving energy storage market conditions.   We mentioned in the recent ESN Premium Friday Briefing that one of the important conclusions is the gap between the grid side (large ground projects) and the user side (residential and industrial and commercial projects). The grid-side installed capacity completed in 2023 will be approximately 2.7GW, and the user-side installed capacity will be approximately 7.3GW.

At the European Large-scale Solar Energy Conference held in Lisbon recently, a speaker said that the policy environment for solar photovoltaics in Europe needs to balance the interests of developers and other industry parties.     The second panel of the conference was themed "Policy, legislation and progress towards the 2023 targets in Europe", with speakers discussing the impact of Brussels policies on the downstream and manufacturing sectors of the European solar industry.   Discussions surrounding the localization of European solar manufacturing (or lack thereof) have been heating up recently. In announcing as-yet unspecified financial support for the industry, EU Energy Commissioner Kadri Simson cited the "very fragile situation" of EU manufacturers.   Driven by the European Solar Photovoltaic Industry Alliance (ESIA), the EU currently aims to achieve 30GW of solar photovoltaic capacity across the entire value chain by 2025.   Discussions surrounding the localization of European solar manufacturing (or lack thereof) have been heating up recently. In announcing as-yet unspecified financial support for the industry, EU Energy Commissioner Kadri Simson cited the "very fragile situation" of EU manufacturers.   Driven by the European Solar Photovoltaic Industry Alliance (ESIA), the EU currently aims to achieve 30GW of solar photovoltaic capacity across the entire value chain by 2025.

According to a new report from energy think tank Ember, solar PV deployment in several European countries has been underestimated by 205GW.     The report, "Transmission Mission: Grids in Europe's Energy Transition," examined grid development plans in 35 countries across Europe's transmission system operators, including the EU, the UK and the Western Balkans, many of which are "out of touch with the realities of the energy transition." ".   According to trade association SolarPower Europe's "business as usual" scenario, 19 of the 23 countries analyzed underestimated solar PV deployment by 205GW by 2030.   The gap between installed solar capacity and grid expansion plans is expected to continue over time, which will exacerbate grid congestion in the short term and solar projects will eventually be stuck waiting to be connected to the grid.   Only four countries - Croatia, Denmark, Finland and the Netherlands - have technical service organizations that expect solar (and wind) capacity to be higher than their current national targets. The difference in these countries ranges from 50% higher in Denmark to 200% higher in Finland.   According to the power grid plans of these four countries, the total installed capacity of solar and wind power is expected to exceed 81GW, exceeding national policy targets.   From a national level, France has the largest absolute gap between its solar installed capacity (35GW) and the national solar installed capacity target (54GW), which will be 19GW by 2030. \   Additionally, a comparison between solar and wind technologies shows that solar tends to be more susceptible to bias, with solar capacity undervalued by 60GW across 11 countries, while wind is undervalued by 27GW.   As shown in the figure below, the difference between a country's national targets and the European TSO grid plan is often caused by the timing difference between the two, with the national plan updating its targets earlier than the European TSO grid plan.   With the rapid development of clean technology, it is increasingly encountering the bottleneck of insufficient grid capacity, leading to grid connection delays, power curtailments, and increased consumer costs.

Continued growth in rooftop solar and "record-breaking" investment in large-scale energy storage will allow renewables to meet nearly 40% of Australia's electricity supply needs in 2023, according to a new report from Australia's Clean Energy Council (CEC).     The "Australian Clean Energy Report 2024" shows that renewable energy accounted for 39.4% of Australia's electricity supply last year, an increase of 9.7%. This growth was driven by 5.9GW of new grid-connected clean energy power capacity, led by rooftop solar.   The CEC said that last year, Australia added 3.1GW of rooftop PV capacity, equivalent to the power generation of 337,498 homes and small businesses. Australia has long been the world's leading rooftop solar market. According to a March 2023 report from the Australian Energy Commission, distributed rooftop solar will meet 14% of Australia's electricity needs in the summer of 2022/23.   A separate report in March from solar industry consultancy SunWiz found that Australia's rooftop solar capacity had exceeded 20GW.   Kane Thornton, chief executive of the Australian Energy Council, said: "Rooftop solar accounted for 28.5% of the country's total renewable energy generation last year. This is evidence of its ability to bring added value and support to more than a third of Australia's households and small businesses. Rooftop solar has been successful when it comes to lowering electricity bills.