Photovoltaic news and pv jobs

Cloudy skies over Intersolar Europe

With mixed feelings and under darkened skies, Intersolar Europe started today in Munich. For the first time the number of exhibitors fell by 16 percent, compared to the previous year. In terms of visitor numbers, Solar Promotion's Markus Elsässer said he also expects a slight decline.

Exhibitor numbers are down at this year's Intersolar Europe.

Solar Promotion GmbH

This year’s market consolidation clearly affected the Intersolar Europe tradeshow, Elsässer said. However, worldwide market expectations for photovoltaics look bright, as Carsten Körnig, general manager of  Germany-based BSW Solar underlined at the opening press conference.

Körnig said he expects at least 28 gigawatts (GW) of newly installed photovoltaic capacity for 2012 worldwide and in Germany at least six GW. In terms of geographic spread of capacity growth, Körnig set out that the main growth markets will be China (+50%), the U.S. (+70%), Japan (+90%), Great Britain (+70%) and India (+300%).

Corresponding to this trend of internalization, the share of international exhibitors at this year’s Intersolar Europe grew to include 49 countries, compared to 2011, where 47 countries were represented. However, as aforementioned, exhibitior numbers fell, from around 2,300 in 2011, to around 1,900 this year.

The major theme of this year’s Intersolar is storage technologies and grid integration. First time visitors will find a special exhibition about photovoltaics and e-mobility at the trade show.

Watch out for more Intersolar coverage over the next couple of days.