Never before has more solar energy been generated in Germany in the first four months of the year than in 2018. But still, we are not achieving our expansion and climate protection targets. Maybe Intersolar will wake up the industry? Or better yet – the politicians.
Intersolar Europe 2018 – a reflection of the global market upswing. This is how the exhibitor promotes the world's leading trade fair for the solar industry. And the figures are correct – despite the increased exhibition space, it has been fully booked three months ago – with a total of 1,1687 exhibitors. Under the new umbrella "The smarter E Europe" the show takes place along with the proven storage trade fair ees Europe. And for the first time together with the trade shows Power2Drive Europe and EM-Power. In Munich from 20th to 22nd June.
Here comes the sun – here comes the Intersolar
When you look at the global expansion of photovoltaics, exhibitor numbers should have reached Intersolar's best times. In 1991, Solar '91 started as a one-day event in Pforzheim with five solar companies. At the Solar '97 there were already 25, two years later 142 exhibitors and 8,400 visitors. Pforzheim became too small, the fair moved to Freiburg in Breisgau and was called Intersolar from then on – as a logical consequence of its increasingly international reputation. 11,505 visitors came to the first Intersolar in 2000 with 185 exhibitors, three times as many in 2007. Intersolar moved to Munich. The 20th anniversary in 2011 was attended by 2,286 exhibitors and 76,738 visitors.
The power of sun
At that time, the installed capacity worldwide was 67.4 gigawatts (GW). The expansion amounted to 27.7 GW. Italy had just
displaced Germany from first place in the statistics with a third of all new
additions. Chinese module manufacturers already had the biggest share on the supplier side at that time. In 2017, installed photovoltaic output worldwide grew by 32 percent to almost 400
GW, in Germany it totaled around 43 GW. That somewhat steals the thunder of the wind energy's growth of about ten percent ... The triumphant advance
of solar energy is mainly attributable to cost reductions in recent years. For the first time it has grown faster worldwide than any other energy source and has thus overtaken the speed at which
coal was added in 2016. Asia, India and Japan recorded the largest growth in
photovoltaics.
Don’t let the sun go down
In the light of this success story and the importance of solar energy for climate protection, it is absurd that Germany is treading water at the energy transition. That the German Minister of Economic Affairs wants to slow down renewables at EU level. That Germany, as the country of the energy transition, is well below the politically defined target corridor of 2500 MW of newly installed PV capacity per year and is thus lagging far behind its own climate targets. Germany – as a pioneer in renewables!
Let the sunshine in
The market is politically capped. This has always made life so difficult for the industry and has already cut ground under many solar companies' feet, particularly in Germany. "Our energy system is ready for significantly more solar energy. It is high time to release the brakes," says Carsten Körnig, CEO of the German Solar Industry Association (BWS-Solar) – and he is right!
Andrea Schneider loves the sun and likes to go out when it shines. She has been following the development of solar energy for over 20 years – privately and as a PR consultant. She believes that solar energy should have become standard around the globe long ago and hopes that Intersolar will give the industry even more power.
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