China sets new goals for distributed solar energy

China works to boost distributed solar energy market share

The Chinese government has put a strong focus on solar energy in recent years, so much so that the country has been targeted by trade disputes and accusations of favoritism toward domestic companies. The Central Government has several ambitious plans for solar energy, one of which concerned distributed solar power generation. China has announced that it has set a goal of 5 gigawatts of distributed photovoltaic power generated per year. The country hopes to meet or exceed this goal every year beginning in 2016.

Meeting new solar energy goals could be a major boon for China

Meeting this goal could have several positive implications for China. The goal would help accelerate the country’s market growth in the solar energy field, as well as reduce domestic energy consumption significantly. Reducing consumption would also mean reducing the amount of money that is spent on energy and the need to produce this energy through fossil-fuels, thus removing a significant amount of pollution from China’s local environment. There are some challenges facing the country that may derail its plans with solar energy, however.

Country continues to face challenges from Europe

China has thrown its considerable industrial strength behind the manufacture of solar energy modules and other technologies. As with other products that China has focused its industry on, this has lead to a massive tide of solar energy products inundating the global market. The sheer number of these products that are being introduced to the market has sparked concerns in Europe, where many solar energy companies are accusing the country of intentionally hurting their position in the market for personal gain. Trade disputes have sparked investigations into Chinese companies and how much government support their are receiving. There are also growing concerns surrounding the overall quality of solar energy systems, which are being developed as cheaply as possible in China.

Initiative launched to help overcome some of the country’s challenges

China has been confronting allegations of corruption and trade disputes for some time and is keen to ensure that the problems it is seeing currently do not have a major impact on its solar energy plans for long. The Central Government has introduced the “Welcome, Support, and Service” initiative, which aims to sidestep much of the bureaucratic red tape that cripples both foreign and domestic businesses. This initiative makes distributed solar energy projects free of surcharges instituted by the Chinese government.