China and Photovoltic (PV) Manufacturing

Energy crises is increasing day by day through out the World. China is trying its best to cope with the energy requirements of the time. In the first two financial quarters of 2010, Suntech Power Holdings Company Ltd. (Wuxi, China) surpassed previous industry leader First Solar Inc. (Tempe, Arizona, U.S.) in sales to become the world's largest solar photovoltaic (PV) manufacturer by revenue. During the third quarter of 2010, both Suntech and JA Solar Holdings Company Ltd. (Zhabei, China) surpassed First Solar in manufacturing capacities as well.

Such developments were hardly surprising to industry observers. This is a good pace of progress. Suntech and JA Solar are the tips of the iceberg in terms of China's enormous PV manufacturing industry, and such stories illustrate the slow consolidation of China as the undisputed center of the PV manufacturing world.

Clean energy manufacturing leaders

These trends have been establishing themselves for years, and are related to China's emergence in 2010 as the world's largest exporter and the economic powerhouse of the 21st century. However, PV manufacturing has unique conditions as an industry, and the reasons for China's dominance in PV manufacturing tell an important story with global relevance for other nations who seek to remain or become clean energy manufacturing leaders in the 21st century.

This report by Solar Server, with the assistance of iSuppli Corporation (El Segundo, California, U.S.), will cover the emergence of China as the world leader in PV manufacturing. Our focus is on recent developments in 2009 and 2010 and particularly shared characteristics of large Chinese PV manufacturers, as expressed by industry leading companies including Suntech, JA Solar, LDK Solar Company Ltd. (Xinyu, China), Yingli Green Energy Holding Company Ltd. (Baoding, China), Trina Solar Limited (Changzhou, China), and others.

Scale of the Chinese PV manufacturing industry

Chinese PV cell and module shipments have gained an increasing share of the world PV market every year since 2004. In 2009, the manufacturing operations of six of the top 15 cell manufacturers and seven of the top 15 module producers were based in China.

When taken together, Chinese manufacturers produced 3.84GW of PV cells and 3.60GW of PV modules during the year, representing roughly 2/5 of the roughly 10 GW of PV cells and the 8 GW of PV modules produced. China's market share of crystalline silicon (c-Si) PV is even higher, as c-Si represents the large majority of cells and modules produced in the nation.

As the scale of the global PV industry has grown and the factors leading to such changes have intensified in 2010, it is estimated that both total cells and modules produced by Chinese companies and market shares have increased as well.