Solar electricity could represent 20% to 25% of global electricity production by 2050, the International Energy Agency (IEA) said this week.
The figures emerge from two new analyses of solar Photovoltaic (PV) and Concentrating Solar Power (CSP).
IEA launched "roadmaps" for the two technologies yesterday, during the Mediterranean Solar Plan Conference hosted by the Spanish presidency of the European Union.
With effective policies in place, PV on residential and commercial
buildings will achieve grid parity–i.e. with electricity grid retail
prices–by 2020 in many regions, IEA said. PV will become competitive at
utility-scale in the sunniest regions by 2030 and provide 5% of global
electricity.
The roadmaps detail the technology milestones that would make greater
adoption possible, highlighting that the two technologies will deploy in
different yet complementary ways: PV mostly for on-grid distributed
generation in many regions and CSP largely providing dispatchable
electricity at utility scale from regions with brightest sun and
clearest skies. PV also helps provide energy access off grid in rural
areas. Together, PV and CSP could generate 9 000 Terawatt hours of power
in 2050.
As PV matures into a mainstream technology, grid
integration and management and energy storage become key issues. The PV
industry, grid operators and utilities will need to develop new
technologies and strategies to integrate large amounts of PV into
flexible, efficient and smart grids. By 2050, PV could provide more than
11% of global electricity.
The IEA expects CSP to become competitive for peak and mid-peak loads by
2020 in the sunniest places if appropriate policies are adopted. Its
further expansion will depend on the development of dedicated transport
lines that will bring CSP electricity to a greater number of large
consumption centers. Some of them will have to be developed within large
countries such as China, India and the USA. Others will cross border,
and many will be needed to link the southern and northern shores of the
Mediterranean Sea.
Thanks to thermal storage, CSP can produce
electricity around the clock and will become competitive with base load
power by 2025 to 2030, IEA said. North America will be the largest producer of CSP
electricity, followed by North Africa and India. North Africa would
most likely export about half its production to Europe, the second
largest consumer. The overall contribution of CSP could–like that of
PV–represent 11% or more of the global electricity demand by 2050.
"This decade is crucial for effective policies to enable the development of solar electricity," Nobuo Tanaka, Executive Director of the IEA, said. "Long-term oriented, predictable solar-specific incentives are needed to sustain early deployment and bring both technologies to competitiveness in the most suitable locations and times."
Tanaka concluded in noting that "solar PV and CSP appear to be complementary more than competing. The firm capacity and flexibility of CSP plants will help grid operators integrate larger amounts of variable renewable electricity such as solar PV and wind power. PV will expand under a broader range of climate conditions and bring clean renewable electricity directly to end-users."
The PV roadmap is available as a pdf at the link below; the CSP roadmap can be accessed here.
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