PV MARKET WRAP
PV AND BEYOND: THE YEAR THAT WAS AND A LOOK AHEAD Last year brought many COVIDrelated challenges to business across the spectrum, with lockdowns limiting site visits and disruptions impacting supply chains. However the rooftop PV market continued to power ahead. Industry’s top analysts have assessed all available data to paint a picture of market trends and the outlook for the year ahead. Here we provide a synopsis of key findings.
TWENTY TWENTY ONE – what a year. One that many would
554MW. The story was different at the top end of NT
rather forget, or at least have been happy to see the
where residential installed capacity came in at 13MW,
end of after the series of rolling restrictions imposed on
down 43 per cent on 2020.
business and lifestyles. But as things panned out it was
Commercial PV fared well during 2021: 16,700
not all bad for renewables, certainly not the rooftop PV
systems with an installed capacity of 563MW, up on
sector which in many ways defied the odds to come out
2020 levels by 16 and 7 per cent respectively and
on top.
reflecting the strong growth in the small (15-20kW)
The proof of the pudding was the amount of installed capacity of small-scale rooftop PV systems which at the
commercial market. Meantime the solar water heating market warmed
end of December 2021 came in at 3,220MW; a healthy
up during 2021, registering 97,800 systems, the highest
10 per cent above the 2,938MW installed in 2020. In all a
since 2011. Victoria was well ahead of other states,
total of 29,888 more residential systems were registered
accounting for 58 per cent of the market with its 56,000
in 2021.
new SWH systems.
The rise of 10 per cent may be a third less than the 15 per cent expected, but nevertheless highlights the
Powering on
ongoing popularity of solar PV in Australia, a nation
Reflecting on 2021, market analyst Warwick Johnston of
that still leads the world with 17GW of installed panels.
SunWiz noted a key trend was the slowdown in growth
That’s more than three million households and small
compared to each of the previous four years that saw
businesses.
annual growth rates of 33 to 50 per cent in the <100kW
According to industry consultant Green Energy Markets (GEM) by year’s end Queensland led the overall
installation category, and a very welcome quadrupling of the market size in those four years.
tally board with 4,483MW of installed capacity, closely
Other than COVID-related causes, he attributes the
followed by New South Wales (4,256MW) and Victoria
slowdown to panel production constraints and inverter/
(3,839MW).
isolator regulations as well as falling electricity prices
Interestingly, and in a departure from the norm, for only the second time since the 2011 introduction of the small-scale residential scheme, the majority of
and feed-in tariffs that impact the economics of rooftop PV. Many of these issues will prevail, however demand for
installations were registered in the first half of the year.
rooftop PV will undoubtedly remain strong, says John
Further analysis reveals the weeks prior Easter and
Grimes of the Smart Energy Council. There is an air of
Christmas fared best.
optimism about the future. “Despite last year’s bumps
Although during 2021 PV systems sized 6-7kW still
the rooftop PV industry managed to forge ahead, albeit
accounted for almost half (49 per cent) of systems,
not quite at the pace of previous years, but nevertheless
larger residential systems continued to become more
a ten per cent rise on that of 2020 indicates the market
popular.
remains robust. Few other markets have performed as
As illustrated in the GEM chart on the opposite page, systems between 7kW and 15kW represented a third of
strongly during the pandemic. “Consumers have developed a real affinity for rooftop
the residential market; that is up from the near quarter
PV and indications are that we will continue to see
(24 per cent) market share in 2020 and a big lift from the
year-on-year growth in uptake,” John Grimes said. “The
15 per cent recorded in 2019.
energy market is undergoing a fundamental transition at
Turning to state take-up and NSW hung on to top
both micro- and macro-level and once we have a federal
spot with its record annual installed capacity of 806MW,
government that recognises and supports the need for
followed by Queensland with 664MW and Victoria at
renewable energy the transformation will accelerate.”
