European grid parity consortium
Grid Parity for residential and commercial consumers "“ the moment when electricity generated from solar photovoltaics is competitive against other sources "“ is in sight in many European countries, concludes the PV Parity project consortium. The European project has assessed the evolution of system prices, retail electricity prices, and cost of financing, as well as the capacity in various countries to self-consume photovoltaic electricity produced. The findings are decisive: Grid parity is imminent in several countries. The smooth transition to full grid parity will be essential to adapt support schemes properly in the coming years.
The PV PARITY project has analysed PV grid parity in the residential, commercial and utility scale segments. After agreeing on a methodology to define the various types of competitiveness for each type of consumer, the project consortium developed national competitiveness roadmaps for each segment in each of the target countries.
Different parameters affect the achievement of grid parity. Competitiveness in the residential and commercial/industrial segments depends on dynamic parameters such as the evolution of retail electricity prices, system prices, cost of financing and the rate of self-consumption of electricity of each user.
In the residential segment the earliest date on which competitiveness can be achieved and the latest one varies widely for the different target countries, with the time range due to irradiation differences, the maturity of each national PV market (which influences cost of capital and thus PV system costs) and the level of retail electricity prices in each country.
According to the results, grid parity is starting to be achieved already in Germany, Southern Italy, Netherlands and Spain in 2012; they should be followed by Northern Italy, Portugal and Austria in the next two years and then progressively by other countries. By the end of the decade, depending on how prices will evolve but also the cost of financing, grid parity could be achieved in all target countries.
Managing the transition towards grid parity will be essential for policy makers in order to avoid further delay or improper evaluation of it. The project partners aim to answer these questions in the next steps of the project development.
The PV PARITY project aims at contributing to the achievement of further PV penetration in the EU electricity market and to the attainment of PV competitiveness at the lowest possible price for the community. The duration for this project is 30 months, starting in June 2011 and ending in November 2013. PV Parity is focusing its analysis on 11 EU countries which are: Austria, Belgium, Czech Republic, France, Germany, Greece, Italy, the Netherlands, Portugal, Spain and the United Kingdom.
