Solar Energy: REpowerEU will be a failure, because there is no production capacity in the EU
The REpowerEU policy will be a failure because, trivially, the necessary production capacity in the EU is lacking. European solar producers would need 42 times the annual production capacity of photovoltaic cells if they are to meet the ambitions of the European Commission with Made in Europe products . US research firm Wood Mackenzie released this figure this week to illustrate how weak the European solar manufacturing industry is.
The Commission has stated its ambition to generate at least 420 GW of new solar generation capacity over the decade in an effort to clear the blockade of Russian gas. WoodMac has estimated that Europe will provide around 331 GW of new solar energy by 2031 and this week said the Commission's "RePower EU" plans have the potential to double that figure.
The reality is that “virtually all” of the 60,000 tonnes of raw polysilicon for solar panels that are additionally produced in the UK are being exported to China because demand in Europe is insufficient. There are simply no production lines in Europe to absorb the crystalline polysilicon produced every year either.
According to WoodMac, three times more polysilicon production capacity per year, 20 times more wafer lines, 42 times more cell production and six times more module capacity would be required to achieve the Commission's higher ambition. According to WoodMac, raw material costs for solar panels have pushed prices up by more than 20% in 2021. The price of polysilicon has tripled over the past 18 months and is expected to remain "high" throughout 2022. aluminum, copper and steel have all increased more than 30% in the past year, according to WoodMac. The cost of solar panel glass is also rising, attributing the increases to escalating natural gas and tin prices. So any attempt to reach the EU's goals will simply result in the explosion of the costs of solar cells, money which, among other things, will all be directed to China, in the absence of internal production.
So the REpowerEU policy, the Commission's solution to the Russian gas problem, turns out to be nothing more than yet another theoretical exercise detached from reality and fundamentally harmful for the economy and the pockets of citizens. Confirming that the Commission is only harm.
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The article Solar Energy: REpowerEU, will be a failure, because there is no production capacity in the EU comes from ScenariEconomici.it .
This is a machine translation of a post published on Scenari Economici at the URL https://scenarieconomici.it/energia-solare-repowereu-sara-un-fallimento-perche-non-ce-capacita-produttiva-nella-ue/ on Mon, 30 May 2022 15:47:42 +0000.