UK solar market to grow five fold over 2010

With solar projects seemingly getting increased investment all around the world, it is not surprising to learn that the solar market is steadily growing. What is surprising however, is that the UK solar market is to grow by a factor of five this year alone, and up to 30 times large by 2015.

This analysis from PriceWaterHouseCoopers reportedly takes into account the widespread roll out of solar photovoltaic material in the UK that has been criticised for a lack of incentives as well as funding.

Despite this, feed-in tariff style grants and funding have rapidly increased installations in European countries, such as Italy, France and Malta, with some nations seeing an annual increase of installations in excess of 300 percent in the first year of the tariffs being available.

In the UK, the Clean Energy Cashback Scheme is being put in place in order to allow UK homeowners that produce their own power via solar energy, to be paid for any electricity they supply to the National Grid.

With these kind of incentives, it is hoped more and more UK homeowners will see the benefits of putting solar panels on their homes, increasing the UK solar market.

"Job and value creation"

Speaking to HomeHeatingGuide.co.uk, PwC Renewables Director Daniel Guttman said, "The significant expansion that may be just around the corner will change today's ‘cottage industry' into a much more professionally organised sector.

"The PV market will become more sophisticated with more complex products and a greater focus on accountability for system performance.

"The industry will need to adapt and develop quickly to ensure that as much of the opportunity in terms of job and value creation is captured within the UK.

"Companies that have been successful so far have benefited from investment in order to fund expansion. Further investment will be required in order to train for and fund the rapid expansion expected. New entrants are likely to expand into the UK in coming years.

"We believe that this will be true across much of the value chain, but particularly downstream around installations."

The report from PriceWaterHouseCoopers is called ‘On the brink of a bright future? Insights on the UK solar photovoltaic market' and also discovered that the UK solar market specialised in smaller, domestic panels whereas the Italian and Spanish markets have larger, more bigger-scale solar farms. To be honest, that makes sense considering the weather in those countries compared to the UK.

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