As Phoenix Solar, gets the job to install the largest PV system in Singapore, on the roof of the main office and distribution centre of CMM, Christophe Inglin reports that solar PV is an attractive investment. The latest Bloomberg New Energy Report shows that Europe is moving ahead in leaps and bounds to a low carbon, renewable energy future. Read More

Phoenix Solar on Monday announced that it will design and build the biggest photovoltaic (PV) system in Singapore for supermarket giant Sheng Siong Group.

The solar project, which will be completed by year-end, is for CMM Marketing Management Pte Ltd, a wholly owned subsidiary of the Singapore-listed supermarket retailer.

Phoenix Solar, an international photovoltaic system integrator with headquarters in Germany and an Asia Pacific branch in Singapore, will install the PV system on the roof of the main office and distribution centre of CMM, which covers an area of 11,000 square metres.

A few weeks ago Christophe Inglin, the managing director of Phoenix Solar, was sings the solar song saying PV is now an attractive investment.

He’s what he had to say for eco-business.com:

PV or photovoltaics is still perceived by many today as a nice but expensive renewable energy source; a highly subsidised luxury for rich nations; or as a token to improve rural electrification in developing countries, also subsidised by multilateral agencies. We praise its great potential and environmental advantages but we regret its lack of economic viability and defer its full deployment to a future date.

For many years, building owners struggled to justify the expense of installing a rooftop PV system, because it would take 20 years or more to pay for itself in electricity savings. PV systems relied on two main justifications:

•To contribute essential points towards a Green Mark award, Singapore’s green building certification. A PV system can increase the Green Mark score by up to 20 points.

•To comply with a company’s global carbon footprint targets.

But rapid changes in the last two years have overtaken these perceptions, and many people are unaware that PV is now commercially viable in Singapore.

Massive increases in global PV module production capacity have driven costs so low in the last two years that a rooftop PV system in Singapore now pays for itself in seven to ten years, depending on system size. This results in an unlevered project IRR (internal rate or return) of 8 to 13 per cent, making PV a very attractive investment and one that needs no additional incentive schemes to justify it.

When Green Mark was the driving factor, even large commercial and industrial buildings needed no more than 300 kWp to achieve their maximum 20 bonus points. It made little commercial sense to add more PV than this to a rooftop. Not surprisingly, there were only three systems larger than this in Singapore by the end of 2012.

But with IRRs exceeding 12 per cent for large systems, building owners will want to maximise the PV they can install on their available roof space. This means that PV systems in Singapore will get bigger, as well as more popular.

Singapore has enough roof space to accommodate 6 GWp of PV capacity, which is enough to meet 15 per cent of projected electricity demand in 2020, assuming today’s per-capita consumption continues.

Thanks to the attractive returns on investment, we expect the installed capacity to more than double in 2013, reaching at least 20 MWp. If this growth rate of continues, Singapore can meet that target within eight to nine years, meaning that PV will soon become a mainstream source of electricity.

Christophe Inglin is the managing director of Phoenix Solar, which specialises in large commercial and utility-scale solar power plants.

Source: www.eco-business.com

Bloomberg New Energy Finance and Business Spectator (25 September 2013):

The week in clean energy – German election provides clean energy clues, EPA says CCS not impossible

Last weekend saw a big win for Angela Merkel, but will clean energy have anything to gain from the Chancellor’s re-election victory?

This is the question many renewable energy investors are considering this week following the victory of Merkel’s right-of-centre grouping in Sunday’s German election.

Merkel and her Christian Democratic Union (CDU), along with sister party the Christian Social Union (CSU), narrowly missed an absolute majority in the federal election, but are now without a coalition partner. The CDU’s former coalition party, the Free Democratic Party (FDP), failed to reach the 5% hurdle needed to win seats in the Bundestag.

Bloomberg New Energy Finance expects it will take weeks for a new coalition to be formed, with the Social Democrats (SPD) or Germany’s Green Party potentially joining forces with the CDU. Both parties are more supportive to renewables than the previous coalition partner, the FDP.

The reform of the Erneuerbare-Energien-Gesetz (EEG) will become a priority once a coalition is formed. The EEG, Germany’s 13-year-old renewable energy act, is designed to increase the share of electricity from green sources to 80% by 2050, from about 23% now.

Under the EEG, the government guarantees above-market prices for wind, biomass and solar power generators. The difference between the rate paid to clean-energy producers, which get priority access to the grid, and the market price, is offset by a charge added to every household bill.

In 2013, the EEG surcharge increased 47% to EUR 0.528/kWh. While there are many factors contributing to this spike, direct support to renewables has taken most of the blame.

Bloomberg New Energy Finance anticipates that the new coalition will rebalance the cost distribution for renewable support in a way that will help alleviate the burden on households. Energy-intensive industries are currently granted exemptions from paying the EEG surcharge. Bloomberg New Energy Finance expects that some but not all of these exemptions will disappear, as both the CDU-CSU and the SPD parties have strong ties to industrial lobbies.

Meanwhile, all carbon market participants will be waiting to hear the new coalition’s position on a draft plan to fix an oversupply in the region’s emissions-trading system.

Germany’s neighbour France is also looking to shake up how it supports renewables as the country begins its “energy transition” away from nuclear.

France will introduce a carbon tax and a law to cap nuclear-power capacity as part of a new energy bill next year to boost renewable generation, President Francois Hollande told an environment conference last week. Hollande has vowed to reduce reliance on nuclear to half of total output by about 2025 while also keeping down consumers’ bills.

Among other things, the energy law in 2014 will define how renewables are financed. Hollande said last week that the above-market guaranteed prices currently paid to green energy producers “can lead to a waste of public funds, profit-taking and speculative behaviour.” Bloomberg New Energy Finance expects the shift in renewable support may move towards a greater use of tenders to keep costs low.

Over in the US, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) announced a plan for limiting emissions from new coal-fired power plants. The new draft rules place a limit of 1,100 pounds of carbon dioxide for each megawatt hour of power produced – a standard that no coal-fired power plant can meet without carbon-capture technology, EPA administrator Gina McCarthy said 20 September in remarks prepared for delivery at the National Press Club in Washington.

In proposing these limits, the EPA is effectively saying that carbon capture and storage (CCS) is feasible, even though the technology is not yet being used on a commercial scale. The agency is implicitly challenging coal interests to demonstrate otherwise.

The EPA’s move sets the stage for a far-reaching set of final rules governing emissions from existing power plants, due by June 2014. McCarthy has said those rules will not require existing coal-fired power plants to install CCS equipment.

There were also big clean energy deals last week. Landis+Gyr won a GBP 600m (USD 956m) contract to supply smart meters in the UK, while Vestas Wind Systems said 20 September it received an order to supply turbine equipment with a capacity of 60MW to Renewable Energy Systems Americas in a deal that could grow to as much as 610MW in 2014 and 2015. Vestas shares closed the trading week 3.3% up.

The Danish wind turbine maker was just one of many other clean energy stocks that ended the week on a positive note. The Wilderhill New Energy Global Innovation Index, or NEX, that tracks 98 clean energy companies, closed last week 2.9% up, beating broader market indexes.

Source: www.businessspectator.com.au/