The PV Review, Q4 2021: Rising prices, policy uncertainty and new product launches
Summary
Despite these headwinds, manufacturers’ research and development teams continued their work on new modules, with JinkoSolar launching its Tiger Neo series, which adopts n-type tunnel-oxide passivated contact (TOPCon) technology and has a power output of up to 620W in mass production, and conversion efficiency of up to 22.3%. Nonetheless, Q4 saw scores of major new project announcements globally, perhaps most notably a 100GW solar and wind buildout now underway in a desert region of China. As well as the aforementioned headwinds, PV Tech reported on analysis published in October that revealed the performance of US solar assets against P50 estimates worsened over the last decade. On the policy front, reports emerged of more module manufacturers seeing some of their shipments into the US blocked in relation to the country’s Withhold and Release Order (WRO) issued earlier in the year, which banned silica-based products made by Hoshine Silicon Industry and its subsidiaries in response to allegations of the use of forced labour in China’s Xinjiang region. Last month also saw the US reject a petition from an alliance of US companies that had been pushing for investigations into alleged circumvention of antidumping and countervailing duties (AD/CVD) on solar PV cells from China.