– Part 2 of 2
* Manzakine Za my dear RiA Friend?
Happy to be back with you. On the first part, we looked at the African market and to complete our analysis, let’s now have a look at the Asian and Latin America markets. They’re both the big children of the Emerging economies house.
1- Asia
In Asia, the emerging markets could almost be split into 2 categories.
- China
In the first category, it would not come at anybody’s surprise to hear the two big nations are China and India. China is not only the biggest emerging market in Asia, it is simply the biggest emerging market in the world. I must confess I sometimes wonder why we are still calling them an emerging economy? Shouldn’t they have emerged already? Especially as they are topping any other major developed economy except the United States (for now?). Nevertheless, it is a debate we could have another time. According to Bloomberg New Energy Finance (BNEF), China on its own has deployed in total more than 201 GW of Clean energy and REN21 Renewables status report is telling us that the total solar PV capacity stood at 77.4 GW at the end of 2016. This is simply impressive. And no doubt that with the decision of Mr Trump, China will continue to affirm its leadership even more.
- India
India is the other country in this group. From BNEF sources, the country total clean energy capacity was recorded at 38.4 GW in 2014. At the end of March 2017, India had installed 12.2GW of utility scale solar, clearly boosted the government revised solar power target to 100GW from 20GW, by 2022. With 31 GW, India has the fourth highest wind installations in the world. As opposed to China, India could not rely on cheap costs of debt to spur the growth but instead using its low wages labour and low-cost equipment to push its market.
Another good success story for India has been the deployment of off-grid renewables to provide electricity access to remote and rural populations. This topic would certainly be explored in the India session on the 19th of June.
- South-East Asia
In the second category, you will find South-East Asia countries like Vietnam and Indonesia. In Vietnam, hydropower remains the most popular alternative, but its market share is expected to significantly reduce by 2030. On the opposite, solar, wind and bioenergy are ready to establish themselves as new energy sources and account for over 10 percent by 2030 according to government sources.
Not standing aside (why would they seriously?) Indonesia is determined to reduce its use of conventional fossil fuels and continues to promote new and renewable sources of energy and increase share of renewables in its energy mix to 23 percent by 2025.
2- Hot Asian Markets
On top of the traditional markets that are China and India, the hot markets to watch in 2017 and 2018 would be Vietnam and Bangladesh for certain and to some extent Nepal and Pakistan as well.
Iran deserves as well special attention. Since the International nuclear accord concluded with the P5+1 nations (US, UK, China, France and Russia) in July 2015, Iran has been attracting lots of investors, including from the clean tech space. With an installed capacity of only 240 MW for a population of 81 million, there is obviously a big market to exploit. Well my dear friend, you’ll be please to know that Iran will get a seat at the Emerging PV summit.
3-Latin America
Latin America is a particularly interesting continent to analyse. Out of 26 countries, 9 have clean energy targets, 13 have auction systems to contract clean energy capacity, 7 have net metering and 2 have functioning Feed-in-tariff (FiT) schemes. It is a demonstration that good policies and not necessarily subsidy could carry the industry. What is also notable is that they have developed a good supply chain to support their ambition. Clearly an example to follow in many countries, especially in the motherland!
In 2016, investment in Latin America and Caribbean were more USD 11 billion. A majority of these investments were directed at wind projects, mainly in Brazil.
- Brazil
Brazil is the main market for Renewable Energy and the country. it generates nearly 76% of its electricity from renewable resources. While wind and hydropower have been the source of Brazil’s renewable energy expansion to date, new solar energy development is showing encouraging investment prospects.
- Chile
With the Atacama Desert (pictured in the featured image), Chile completely dominates the solar sector in Latin America. The Chilean market account for 66% of the 4 GW of Solar installed so far and in 2016, 86% of the new installations were in Chile. In fact, Solar is the cheapest source.
4- Hot LatAM markets
In addition to Chile, three other markets should be watched carefully for 2017-2018.
- Honduras
Already a key player with 16% on the current 3GW of Solar capacity in the continent, Honduras has boosted its solar market with a generous FiT. Along with a new electricity law, The FiT has created major changes to the renewable energy sector in the country. The trend of major projects observed in 2015 and 2016 is set to continue for the coming years.
- Mexico
The Mexican government aim to triple the total amount of clean energy generation and to achieve a 9.5GW target by 2018 is a huge logistical and operational challenge by any standards. To put it into perspective, achieving the 2018 target alone equates to adding new operational wind farms equivalent to Canada’s 23-year cumulative installed capacity in less than 2 years. In addition, Mexico as also set an ambitious target of achieving 50% of their electricity generation from clean energy sources by 2050 (Nuclear energy included, isn’it clean afterall?).
- Uruguay
In less than 10 years the country has slashed its carbon footprint and lowered electricity costs, without government subsidies. Renewables provide 94.5% of the country’s electricity, prices are lower than in the past relative to inflation. There are also fewer power cuts because a diverse energy mix means greater resilience to droughts. Now to set the record straight, it is important to add that it was a very different story just 15 years ago. Back at the turn of the century oil accounted for 27% of Uruguay’s imports and a new pipeline was just about to begin supplying gas from Argentina. Now the biggest item on import balance sheet is wind turbines. A notable change.
Biomass and solar power are ramping up and when added to existing hydropower, Clean energy accounts for 55% of the country’s overall energy mix (including transport fuel) compared with a global average share of 12%. Simply astonishing!
This completes our review of HOT markets in the Clean Energy industry. You will certainly learn more at the conference. Hoping to see you there. Time is flying and only few couple of days to get your ticket so be quick. You should also get your special RiA offer.
Stay HOT!!
*Manzakine Za: “How are you?” in Berber
Berber is spoken by large populations of Algeria, Morocco and Libya and by smaller populations of Tunisia, northern Mali, western and northern Niger, northern Burkina Faso, Mauritania and in the Siwa Oasis of Egypt. The number of Berber people is much higher than the number of Berber speakers. The bulk of the populations of the Maghreb countries are considered to have Berber ancestors. In Algeria, for example, a majority of the population consists of Arabised Berbers.
Summary
Hot Asian Markets to watch in 2017 – 2018
- China
- India
- Vietnam
- Indonesia
- Bangladesh
- Nepal
- Pakistan
Hot Latin American Markets to watch in 2017 – 2018
- Chile
- Honduras
- Mexico
- Uruguay
Source
- Global Solar Finance & Investment: Emerging PV Markets, http://globalfinance.solarenergyevents.com/
- Climatescope 2016, http://global-climatescope.org/en/
- BNEF_Mapping the Global Frontiers For Solar Energy Investment
- REN21 – Renewables 2017 Global Status Report
