The US Department of Commerce announced on March, 11th that the anti-subsidy initial judgment for certain Chinese crystalline silicon PV products will be extended from March, 28th to June, 2nd. EnergyTrend, a research division of TrendForce, indicates that the delay will stimulate PV market demand and in turn boost the price.
The renewable energy market rapidly grows in Australia due to the recent policies and incentives. However, the economic recession and the decreased system price caused the Australian government to revise the subsidy rate downward.
Ever since the Japanese government passed the Act on Special Measures concerning the Procurement of Renewable Energy in July, 2012, the amount of grid-connected installation in Japan continued to increase. According to EnergyTrend, a research division of TrendForce, 24.5GW of PV systems have passed the certification, in which, 22.5GW were systems above 10kW. It showed that the focus has started to shift from residential systems to utility-scale power plants after the new Act took place.
Last week, there were two headlines for solar industry on both positive and negative sides – the positive one was that China officially announced its new PV system installation target of 14GW in 2014, which represented a strong market demand; the negative one was that the U.S. International Trade Commission (ITC) had filed SolarWorld’s petition against dumping and subsidies.
Taiwanese manufacturers hold conservative attitudes toward shipments after Chinese Lunar New Year due to the US-China trade war and the end of fiscal year in Japan. However, according to EnergyTrend, a research division of TrendForce, major Chinese and Taiwanese manufacturers still maintain regular shipment while some of them even accelerate shipments to the US and Japan. Thus, sales revenue can still be high in February. It’s projected that the US-China trade war’s impact on Taiwanese manufacutrers won’t begin to show until March.