The outlook for the brains of the solar system, inverters, remains bright. During a session on solar inverters at the Intersolar NA show in San Francisco, Calif., Cormac Gilligan, manager – PV inverters and BOS research at IHS Energy U.S., presented several trends he sees in the global market that are affecting the United States.
Gilligan said it’s a good time to be in the global solar market. With increasing demands on inverter functions, there’s a lot of opportunity for innovation. Still, many challenges including price pressure, remain.
Gilligan studies global PV shipments, not installations. He sees a lot of price pressure on inverter manufacturers right now, especially non-Asian companies. But suppliers are continually coming through on reducing the cost of their products. He expects shipments to remain flat in 2016, but also prices to decrease.
Also, this effort to reduce price will accelerate demand for 1,500-V components. Gilligan noted that this market really took off in 2015 lead by GE. This year, he expects it to grow greatly toward the second half of the year, when most inverter manufacturers are planning to launch new products. IHS sees the 1,500-V market growing to 50% of the market in the next three years.
Another trend, is that three-phase string (60kW plus) and central inverters (1.5MW plus) are increasing in size. In fact, string inverters are approaching sizes of small central inverters at one point. However, the difference is that even with this power, string inverters have a lighter weight. Manufacturers are taking what they’ve learned in the wind industry and applying it to solar. Gilligan said a huge growth of string inverters in utility projects is expected by 2020. Even with more three-phase low power, string, inverters being used in larger projects, IHS research shows that central inverters aren’t going anywhere soon, and will still account for more than half of shipments in 2016. There’s growth to be seen in string inverters too. However, module-level power electronics are gaining traction.
Gilligan expects increased global PV inverter shipments to reach 100GW by 2020, which will help suppliers survive today’s price pressure. Utility scale (5MW and up) will remain the dominant installation type into 2020. Commercial solar is gradually gaining traction. This progression emulates other markets. IHS expects the U.S. to account for 30% of global inverter revenues in 2016.
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