Energy Taiwan 2019 to chart momentous journey of island’s solar market
Sep 27, 2019 09:33 PM ET
Global experts are set to gather in Taipei in less than a month to take stock of the island’s strengths and challenges as it embarks on a multi-gigawatt renewable transformation by 2025.
Energy Taiwan 2019 will explore the current prospects for the territory’s clean energy industries, including solar, wind, hydrogen and energy storage specialists.
PV-dedicated sessions at Taipei’s Nangang Exhibition Centre will examine industry themes including the advent of bifacial modules, AI applications in O&M and prospects for concentrated systems.
The Taiwan get-together – forecast to attract 17,000 domestic and foreign visitors – will take place as the island’s government ramps up efforts to put its PV makers back on the global map.
The policy campaign is meant to help solar manufacturers regain ground lost to rivals in mainland China, with the past two years marking losses and restructuring for key Taiwanese names.
Laws including the latest Renewable Energy Development Act, revised this year to add a 20GW-by-2025 solar deployment goal, could help matters by boosting the downstream landscape.
Bird-inspired parks to spearhead solar growth
The new target finds Taiwanese PV at a time of growth, with the industry reaching the 3.3GW installed capacity mark in May 2019.
The island recently witnessed the operational launch of what is billed as its largest ground-mounted PV project to date, the 70MW Mingus solar plant in Chiayi County.
The work of developer Vena Energy, the 195,000-module array’s design was inspired in the black-faced spoonbill, an at-risk bird species that migrates into the nearby salt plains every winter.
The utility-scale PV project is one of a series currently making headway in Taiwan, including Taipower’s 100MW scheme by Taichung city and a 100MW pipeline by Sunseap and Pacific Green.
A recent PV Tech Power feature examined the strategies and obstacles for Taiwan Solar Energy Corporation (TSEC) and other PV makers as they seek to supply developers home and abroad.
TSEC, for one, told this publication it has adapted to competition from mainland China by moving from cell to module production and refocusing on Taiwanese downstream clients.
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