This analysis presents the existing PV inverter solutions and their main parameters evolution (size, efficiency, cost, reliability). PV Inverter Trends report allows to understand better the main technical challenges, current solutions and future trends regarding those parameters.
Source: Yole DéveloppementThis market and technological study also includes an important topic, which has recently appeared as a key point for PV inverter business: the evolution of its environment.
Photovoltaic plants can have highly diversified structures due to plenty of characteristics: local configuration, presence of sources of shadow, distance between buildings, available area, and size of the installation, thus, one of the objectives of this report is to apprehend the evolution tendency for those architectures, and see the consequence on PV inverter systems and on players’ strategy.
Inverter market forecasts according to our segmentation – residential, industrial and buildings, solar farms – are shown and analyzed taking into account the 2009 crisis and impact on PV industry.
Market trends
PV inverter business is following general PV market trends: the latter being driven by financial supports provided by governments and development of well-established companies.
Yole Développement has estimated the 2008 PV inverter market a bit more than €2.5 billion, mainly driven by Spanish solar farm segment and German market. And Yole Développement does not expect 2009 PV inverter business to overcome this amount.
“Effectively, 2009 has faced the crisis and seen Spain cut out of its economical advantages, explained Brice Le Gouic, Market Analyst, Power Electronics & Compound Semiconductors at Yole Développement. On the other hand, 2009 has also seen the birth of new countries ready to implement PV as a new source of energy, meaning very interesting feed‐in tariffs and loans. And PV inverter for residential segment is now entering in a standardization era.”
Newest PV inverter developments have shown interesting results at different levels: evolution of key characteristics, efficiency, cost, reliability, use of new materials (SiC, GaN), and adoption of disruptive technologies like micro‐inverters -- all those parameters imply an important variety of players strategy.
Those latest advancements are having and will have consequent impacts on PV inverters themselves and on the environment into which they evolve: high-sized installation demand induces an increase of inverter size and centralization, and new inverter solutions provide atypical plant architectures.
Indeed, besides centralization trend and the objective to provide bigger inverters, micro-inverters appear as an alternative solution, challenging every well‐established characteristics of classical inverter industry.
Moreover, the recent acquisition of OKE by SMA is a revealing fact of micro‐inverters introduction on the market. As a consequence, those recent items have a significant impact on classical PV inverter business, industry and players.
Nevertheless, the early stage of production adoption of those technological products justifies Yole Développement’s estimation: “Micro‐inverters technology will stay below 1 percent of 2009 market, says Brice Le Gouic, from Yole Développement”.
Those technological breakthrough and the high opportunity that PV inverter market represents have a serious impact on players’ behaviors: most of them who used to consider the inverter as a final product, now sees an interest in integrating new functionalities for a quick return on investment of the global installation:
• Monitoring
• Electrical protection
• Services like on‐site maintenance, warranty, free software…
Thus, vertical integration of the PV supply chain keeps on evolving and companies are working closer on common objectives for an accurate and complete offer.
PV Inverter Trends: Catalogue price: Euros 3,690.
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