Chinese PV Industry Brief: China could add 65 GW of solar this year as Longi order gives GCL-Poly a much-needed lift

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Trade body the China Photovoltaic Industry Association (CPIA) has predicted the nation will add 55-65 GW of solar this year. CPIA vice president and secretary general Wang Bohua made the prediction during a speech to the organization's annual conference on Wednesday and also confirmed PV statistics from 2020. Wang said China added 48.2 GW of generation capacity last year, a year-on-year rise of 60% to take the cumulative figure to 253 GW. Polysilicon output rose 14.6% on 2019, to 392,000 metric tons, said Wang, with the industry producing 19.7% more wafers, at 161.3 GW for the year; 22.2% more cells, for 134.8 GW; and 26.4% more modules, at 124.6 GW.

The State Power Investment Corporation (SPIC) this week announced solar and wind projects accounted for 21.86 GW of the 27.55 GW of new generation capacity it added last year. The state-owned entity has set a more modest renewables capacity target for this year, of 15 GW. By the end of December, SPIC said, it had hit 29.6 GW of total solar generation capacity, together with a cumulative 30.9 GW of wind farms.

Solar manufacturer Longi on Tuesday revealed details of a contract to buy 91,400 metric tons of polysilicon from GCL-Poly subsidiary Zhongneng Silicon, with the supply set to start next month and run until the end of 2023 and prices to be calculated monthly. Based on the latest poly prices released by Taiwanese analyst PV Infolink, the deal would be worth around RMB7.33 billion (US$1.13 billion), a figure which Longi said would equate to around 31% of its operations costs during 2019. The deal will come as a boost to GCL-Poly, which suffered a cross default on Saturday after failing to settle US$500 million worth of Hong Kong-issued, three-year senior notes.

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