Japan’s
solar sector has
had a stellar two years of growth,
however it appears likely that a sizeable part of the 69.4 GW of projects that
have gained approval under the country’s FIT program will not be built because
of grid constraints. RTS Corporation has come to this conclusion after a meeting
of a grid capacity working group comprised of Japanese utilities and the
Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry (METI), which administrates the solar
FIT program.
Seven
utility districts submitted potential grid hosting capacity for PV projects in
their respective jurisdictions and the capacity of solar projects that have
received approval, both with and without grid access agreements. In figures
compiled by RTS Corporation, it appears that while 69.4 GW of PV projects, totally around
1.37 million arrays, have received approval for FIT payments by METI, only 51 GW
of that is likely to be grid connected. This leaves 17.336 GW of projects
potentially stranded without grid connection.
In
what may be an important caveat, some of those 17.5 GW of projects may go ahead
if “unlimited grid curtailment” or battery storage capacity is included as a
part of the project.
The
utility regions where projects under development are likely to be left without
grid connection include those administered by Kyushu Electric Power (with
approximately 9.8 GW of grid capacity shortfall), Tohoku Electric Power (5.4
GW), Hokkaido Electric Power (1.7 GW), Shikoku Electric power (421 MW), Hokurku
Electric Power (252 MW) and Okinawa Electric Power (250 MW).
Grid
capacity constraints have been expected in Japan for some time with last week’s WG
determination being the first official indication of the size of the grid
shortfalls. RTS Corporation has previously indicated that utilities may be keen
to keep some grid capacity in reserve for shuttered nuclear capacity.
Remote
curtailment under FIT program
Proposed changes to the FIT program have also been mooted at the WG meeting.
These include projects that may be looking to expand capacity or may look to
change PV component suppliers.
Interestingly remote curtailment capabilities may be required of PV arrays in an
expanded number of utility districts. Previously this had only applied in the
Hokkaido Electric Power area, and it now includes a further five districts.
RTS
Corporation describes the remote curtailment capability as follows: “Obligation
to install inverter with remote control function. (It takes time to develop the
system and tentatively conventional inverters are allowed to install if project
developers committed to additionally install the system.)” The proposed changes
to the FIT program have been opened for public submissions, with January 9th
2015 set as the closing date for submissions.
While
grid constraints potentially threatening 17.5 GW of projects is significant, RTS
Corporation expects more than 50 GW to be installed under the current FIT
program and given these constraints.
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