Figure 6 - uploaded by Gregory F. Nemet
Content may be subject to copyright.
Crystalline PV efficiency: highest laboratory cells vs. average commercial modules. Data: Christensen (1985); Maycock (1994, 2002); Grubb and Vigotti (1997); Menanteau (2000); Green et al. (2001).
Source publication
The extent and timing of cost-reducing improvements in low-carbon energy systems are important sources of uncertainty in future levels of greenhouse-gas emissions. Models that assess the costs of climate change mitigation policy, and energy policy in general, rely heavily on learning curves to include technology dynamics. Historically, no energy te...
Context in source publication
Context 1
... raise capital and to take on the risk of large investments that enable construction of large manufacturing facilities appear to have played much bigger roles than learning by experience in enabling cost reductions. These results support Dutton and Thomas (1984)’ finding that “sometimes much of what is attributed to experience is due to scale.” Learning-by-doing is only one of several reasons behind the doubling in commercial module efficiency. Data on the highest laboratory cell efficien- cies over time shows that of the 16 advances in efficiency since 1980 (Surek, 2003) 15 , only six were accomplished by firms that manufacture commercial cells. Most of the improvements were accomplished by universities, none of which would have learned from experience with large-scale production. That government and university R&D programs produced 10 of the 16 breakthroughs in cell efficiency while producing a trivial amount of the industry’s cumulative capacity suggests that the effect of learning-by-doing on improving module efficiency is weak. Further, the rapid rise in laboratory cell efficiency from 1983-1990 (Fig. 6) immediately followed the unprece- dented $ 1.5b investment in worldwide PV R&D in the previous 5 years (IEA, 2005). Experience may help firms generate ideas for incremental efficiency improvements. It may also play a role in facilitating the transition from producing efficient cells of a few watts in a laboratory to producing large modules that can operate reliably under ambient conditions. Still, ...
Citations
... Experience curves for solar PV systems available in the literatures have been analyzed to derive a learning factor based on assumptions on annual growth rates of PV installations. These curves are based on the theory that experience reduces costs and that as a result costs decline in logarithmic proportion to increases in cumulative capacity (Nemet, 2006). Experience curves for the module price display a historic learning rate of 22% in the range period 1976-2010. ...
Subsidy programs, such as feed-in tariffs, designed to make renewable technologies cost competitive with fossil fuels in electricity generation, have been effective in a number of nations. However, these subsidies can become very costly and they raise questions whether there are fair conditions for competition for different energy sources. As a result even effective programs face an uncertain future, changes in political support following the financial crises in Europe and the United States have demonstrated. In the case of solar photovoltaic energy, cost declines resulting from market-expansion schemes and the overall reductions in the price of photovoltaic cells have been significant particularly over the past decade. Yet, they have still left solar power up to 50% more expensive than conventional options. As an alternative in this paper we describe a financing tool based on a pollution abatement methodology. In developing this levelized cost of electricity framework we build a methodology to examine, and then utilize, the social costs and impacts of energy generation technologies. We find that as a means to bridge the cost gap between current conventional energy process and retail solar energy, a program based on a Property Assessed Clean Energy (PACE) loan program would, in the short-term, be an effective tool to accelerate grid parity between solar and conventional energy generation and in the long-term provides a theoretically and financially sound alternative to subsidy-based incentives.
... For many years, the price of modules has followed a well-documented learning curve of a 20% reduction for every doubling of global module shipments (see Appendix C). A module manufacturer benefits from the shared knowledge and experience gained at all of its global factories (Nemet 2006). For example, First Solar has often touted the benefits of its Copy Smart production approach, which includes standard process and facility designs. ...
The price of photovoltaic (PV) systems in the United States (i.e., the cost to the system owner) has dropped precipitously in recent years, led by substantial reductions in global PV module prices. However, system cost reductions are not necessarily realized or realized in a timely manner by many customers. Many reasons exist for the apparent disconnects between installation costs, component prices, and system prices; most notable is the impact of fair market value considerations on system prices. To guide policy and research and development strategy decisions, it is necessary to develop a granular perspective on the factors that underlie PV system prices and to eliminate subjective pricing parameters. This report's analysis of the overnight capital costs (cash purchase) paid for PV systems attempts to establish an objective methodology that most closely approximates the book value of PV system assets.
This paper constructs panel data from an 11-year data set on all 47 prefectures of Japan, covering the period 1996-2006 . We use this data set to analyze the factors affecting photovoltaic (PV) system diffusion. Our empirical results show that the regional government policy clearly helps to promote PV system adoption. It is also found that installation costs have a significant negative effect on PV system adoption, whereas housing investment and environmental awareness among residents have a positive effect. We believe that this finding has a significant implication for further PV system diffusion because it suggests the importance of regional diffusion policies reflecting the environmental awareness of regional residents.
Climate change has become a global issue. Almost all countries, including China, are now considering adopting policies and measures to reduce greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions. The power generation sector, as a key source of GHG emissions, will also have significant potential for GHG mitigation. One of the key options is to use new energy technologies with higher energy efficiencies and lower carbon emissions. In this article, we use an energy technology model, MESSAGE-China, to analyze the trend of key new power generation technologies and their contributions to GHG mitigation in China. We expect that the traditional renewable technologies, high-efficiency coal power generation and nuclear power will contribute substantially to GHG mitigation in the short term, and that solar power, biomass energy and carbon capture and storage (CCS) will become more important in the middle and long term. In the meantime, in order to fully bring the role of technology progress into play, China needs to enhance the transfer and absorption of international advanced technologies and independently strengthen her ability in research, demonstration and application of new power generation technologies.
