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Solar tracker shipments reached new record levels in 2019 with
shipments exceeding 31GW globally, an increase of 55 percent
year-on-year. Exceptional demand in the United States as well as
multiple 1 GW plus markets in Brazil, Mexico, Chile, Spain and
Australia helped propel shipments to new heights. Furthermore, for
many suppliers active in the United States the stepdown in the
investment tax credit (ITC) and the willingness of developers to
safe harbor for projects yet to be built has meant that 2020
started very strongly for numerous suppliers.
US market remains key but solar trackers increasingly
adopted in new markets
The supplier landscape continued to be extremely competitive as
leading suppliers expanded into new markets globally as solar
tracker technology becomes increasingly accepted by developers,
EPC's and the financial community. Leading suppliers such as
Nextracker and Array technologies accounted for almost half of
global shipments as they both enjoyed a strong year due to booming
utility-scale market and as developers in the United States safe
harbored trackers in order to safeguard a higher ITC rate.
Solar trackers are uniquely positioned to assist with safe
harbor as they do not degrade compared to solar modules.
Additionally, prices are less likely to decrease relative to other
balance of system components and by their nature, the components
are relatively robust for storage while waiting to be installed.
Other suppliers such as Gamechange solar, Soltec, Nclave, Convert
Italia and PVH were all active in the United States and some
suppliers received significant orders to safe harbor in 2019.
Figure 1: World PV tracker supplier market rankings in 2019
Shipments (MWdc)
The top-ten supplier rankings continued to be dominated by
suppliers from United States, Spain, Italy, Germany and China as a
result of strong domestic market demand and their willingness to
expand abroad. Demand for trackers in mature markets such as United
States, Spain and Australia continued to be strong but demand in
recent years has grown in emerging markets such as Brazil, Mexico,
Chile, Argentina, South Africa, Saudi Arabia and United Arab
Emirates (UAE). However, IHS Markit expects volatile demand for
solar trackers in these emerging markets in the next 1-2 years due
to the impact of COVID-19 globally. PV projects in the pipeline
that are not at an advance stage in some of these markets are
expected to be delayed over the next year or two but overall, these
markets will remain attractive for solar trackers due to the higher
irradiation and the fact that most of the markets have large
targets for large utility-scale PV projects.
Figure 2: Global tracker installations by major
2020-2024
Middle East and Africa to drive next phase of growth for
solar tracker suppliers
Latin America has been one of the key emerging markets for solar
trackers in recent years but the Middle East and Africa (MEA)
region is expected to be increasingly attractive markets in the
next five years. Egypt and South Africa have already embraced solar
tracker technology along with markets such as Saudi Arabia and the
UAE. Nascent markets such as Oman are expected to install solar
trackers while markets such as Jordan, which have a substantial
installed base of projects with solar trackers, are expected to
keep utilizing this technology. A plethora of African countries
with large utility-scale projects are providing a testbed for
showcasing the added benefits of solar trackers. IHS Markit
predicts that there will be a mix of suppliers active in these
markets. Some suppliers such as Pia Solar who have been very active
in South Africa is well placed to expand into other African markets
as they open up while other suppliers such as Arctech, Soltec,
Convert Italia, Nextracker, PVH and Ideematec who installed
trackers in specific markets across the MEA region can leverage
these real world examples to showcase to partners the benefits of
their offerings.
Despite Asia being the largest region for solar installations in
the next five years, it will be a challenging market for solar
tracker suppliers. Overall, many of the largest markets such as
India, China and Japan still prefer fixed tilt structures due to
climatic conditions, site limitations, the availability of cheap
labor and sensitivity to higher upfront capital expenditure.
Australia continues to be the most attractive market as customers
are very comfortable with the technology and its added
benefits.
Bifacial modules and larger modules to improve cost
competitiveness of solar trackers
Single-axis tracker suppliers are riding the waves of the rapid
innovation underway in the solar module market. Next generation
modules are increasingly being released which are much larger in
size in wattage terms and are expected to have higher efficiencies.
Module suppliers are also ramping-up production of bifacial modules
that can enable a further energy gain of up to 20 percent subject
to ground conditions that govern the albedo effect.
Albeit that solar trackers benefit hugely from module
innovation, solar tracker suppliers continue to invest in research
and development in order to take advantage of the benefits of new
module innovation. Tracker suppliers often redesign torque tubes,
clamps as well as undertake in-depth wind and structural testing of
any new tracker re-design when new modules are released on the
market.
Overall, solar tracker prices are expected to continue to
decline on a dollar cost per watt basis as the energy production
per module continues to increase .The major benefit to developers
and EPC's will be the improved energy yield of using higher powered
bifacial modules along with solar trackers which is expected to
greatly improve the levelized cost of electricity for utility-scale
projects and make solar more cost competitive with other forms of
energy generation.
IHS Markit experts are available for consultation on the
industries and subjects they specialize in. Meetings are virtual
and can be tailored to focus on your areas of inquiry. Book in a
consultation with Cormac Gilligan.
Cormac Gilligan is an associate director for the Solar
& Energy Storage team at IHS Markit.
