Modeling the impact of solar thermal support policies

The 2020 RES-targets of the EU until 2020 require substantial growth of RES-technologies and sectors. Solar thermal energy can provide an increasing share of this amount, in particular looking on the period beyond 2020. However, this will need corresponding ambitious policy instruments and support. This paper provides scenarios for solar thermal energy in selected European countries (AT, GR, LT, NL, PL, UK) up to 2030. A techno-economic bottom-up model is applied for simulating the impact of different policy instruments (and design options of these instruments). In particular, the focus is on the following policy instruments: economic incentives and RES-Heat obligations. The results are based on a comparison of these different scenarios and provide insight into barriers, challenges and opportunities for solar thermal energy in the selected regions. The paper ends with discussions regarding the role of the solar thermal targets in NREAPs and provides conclusions for the design of solar thermal support instruments. The paper is based on the work done within the IEE project RES-H Policy (www.res-h-policy.eu).