Japan retreats from No. 2 in solar photovoltaic capacity

Tuesday 07th April, 05:33 AM JST

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10 Comments

Mark_McCracken at 09:50 AM JST - 7th April

Retreats? It makes it sound like the Number 2 position is dangerous, or that the movement was voluntary. Perhaps "Slips" or "Falls" would be better.
DeepAir65 at 10:06 AM JST - 7th April

wow - good on Germany. Hopefully that debunks the theory that solar is only for hot climates...
buddha4brains at 10:15 AM JST - 7th April

This may be temporary as Sharp is building a major solar panel manufacturing facility in Sakai and another companies elsewhere as well. Anyway the relative ranking is less important than total output. I hope it doubles in the next two years.
BigInJapan at 12:54 PM JST - 7th April

Still better than being bitten by Britten or Iceland. :) Spain at least have sun, it will be a good excuse.
bdiego at 01:43 PM JST - 7th April

Competition is great..its about time too.
Yelnats at 02:54 PM JST - 7th April

clearly indicating that Japan is lagging far behind in the development of renewable energy.

It is not lagging far behind in the development of renewable energy. That is a stupid statement. It means that they are not selling enough of it to the public. Did Spain develop its own technology for it? I doubt it. It is probably Japanese technology.
larguero at 03:09 PM JST - 7th April

I think the fall has to do with the ending of a subsidy for installing solar panels at private homes a couple of years ago. Spain adopted a similar system where the electric companies must buy the electricity that houses with solar panels produce at a very high price. Solar technology is not advanced enough to be economically viable to install solar panels, if there is no subsidies scheme.
DeepAir65 at 06:54 AM JST - 8th April

A friend in UK uses solar water heating and even in winter she says she saves significantly. Even if the water only gets up to 20 degrees C from solar that is a saving because it takes less energy to get it up to hot tap temperature.

The gov here keep talking about promoting it and I believe there is a small subsidy but it is just too expensive in Japan
Andrew66 at 12:41 PM JST - 8th April

Solar and wind energy will not be feasable until 2014.

Yelnats, Spain does have its own technology. Just an example of a succesful solar energy company there:

http://www.isofoton.com/index.asp?idioma=_ing

I hope you are not one of those americans who think Spain is in Mexico and that they don't have microwaves and cook with fire...
PepinGalarga at 09:45 AM JST - 12th April

Photovoltaic technology actually works BETTER in cooler climates, as long as there is proper irradiation. Most panels lose 3-5% of their rated output per every C of temp increase above 25C. If the outside temp is 30C thats already up to 25% cut.

I look to China and other countries to greatly increase in production and installed base of photovoltaics. Once thin films (not silicon based) come into mass production, there is no stopping them.