In the photovoltaic industry their is a market imbalance between supply and demand beginning during the second quarter of 2011. This is due to the debt crisis in Europe, the U.S. "double reverse" and a variety of factors. For photovoltaic products, prices have continued to decline, and with the market downturn, the industry crisis has been worsening. The main problems: the current global PV industry is in oversupply, leading to fierce competition among enterprises, product prices have fallen dramatically, giving the entire industry losses, and due to this unfavorable situation some companies went bankrupt. Affected by the debt crisis in Europe, European countries significantly reduced solar subsidies, leading to the European market having PV installed capacity reductions and thus there has been an end-market demand decline. The U.S. "double reverse" investigation on Chinese dumping practices has had a direct impact on the competitiveness of China's PV products in the United States and has weakened the profitability of PV companies in the U.S. market.
From the current U.S. "double reverse" despite the fact that this has suppressed the PV industry in China, it explains the importance of the PV industry, solar PV has great strategic significance. There is an international PV market downturn with shrinking demand, the Chinese PV companies who where export-oriented were dealt a heavy blow. PV companies in China's market is mainly exports to Europe, Today, the European Photovoltaic Solar Energy subsidies significant declined and the U.S. "double reverse" has forced the Chinese PV companies to start thinking about exploring new markets. They are starting to focus on the domestic market once again and it has become the focus of the PV industry's attention.
The energy crisis and environmental issues both greatly restrict the social and economic development of the world, the PV industry has become an increasingly important way globally to responded to the energy crisis, to ease the pressure on the environment and to achieve sustainable development. Experts predict that the proportion of the solar photovoltaic share of global energy will reach 25% by 2050. Development in this context means great news for the world photovoltaic industry, the PV industry in China has achieved rapid development and great progress, but it is also facing serious challenges.
Ministry of Industry and Information Technology officially launched on February 2012 the solar photovoltaic industry "12th Five-Year development plan ", the plan made it clear that China will adhere to both on grid and off-grid applications combining" the countryside, enriching the people, and limiting energy shortage as the goals, to support small-scale photovoltaic systems, photovoltaic power generation systems and applications such as off-grid applications, combined with the construction and development of a variety of PV products. May 23, Premier Wen Jiabao chaired a State Council executive meeting re-emphasizing the "dependable growth” of the PV industry, and in light of changes China must increase the pre-tune fine-tuning efforts to improve policy relevance, flexibility and China must act in a forward-looking manner, and actively take policy measures to expand demand. In specific industries, in addition to the early introduction of energy-saving projects that benefit energy expansion, He made explicit reference for both public facilities and families to have access to self supporting and self-contained solar energy and other new energy products, accelerating the popularization of FTTH. Improving the energy network has become the focus of the solar industry.
International Energy Network analysts believe that in Chinese enterprises, in order to survive in the harsh market environment, the industry requires not only policy and funding support, but also needs to continue to strengthen their core technology development, and upgrade technology to reduce costs to enhance the core competitiveness of industries. And they must follow the in-depth implementation of the solar photovoltaic industry "12th Five-Year Plan”