Competitiveness of a European PV Manufacturing Chain

Today, solar power is one of the cheapest ways of providing energy internationally, partly because of the excellent R&D work in Europe. Prices of modules have fallen by half in the past three years, and at the same time the use of solar power has been steadily increasing. The reason why there has been an increase in the use of solar energy in Europe and Germany is the achievement of the climate targets of the Paris Agreement. While the machines for the production of solar modules are still manufactured in Germany, the production of cells has now almost completely migrated to Asia. Therefore, the VDMA commissioned a study from Fraunhofer ISE to evaluate whether the production of solar modules at competitive costs could again be realized in Europe. This paper presents the results of the VDMA study.