Switzerland offering rebates to lift solar PV market

GlobalData analysis has reported that the Swiss solar photovoltaic market is on the verge of suffering a slump in the aftermath of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Switzerland has offered to increase financial support by another $47 million through rebates to offset this threat and support residential and commercial rooftop solar.

This means that the solar PV rebate program would provide about $387.6 million. This attempt is in line with stopping any potential solar market collapse due to the pandemic.

After hydropower and nuclear power, solar PV installations form the third major source of energy in Switzerland.

“In 2018, the Swiss Photovoltaic Association, Swissolar, introduced the rebate scheme to benefit the residential and commercial PV customers. The rebate scheme was targeted at not only reducing the waiting time for the implementation of FIT contracts but also guarantee maximum coverage of 30% of the investment costs. The scheme acted as a massive push for more consumers to apply for the solar PV systems.”

Somik Das, senior power analyst at GlobalData.

A significant number of residential PV project applications came in within months of the introduction of the scheme, and further applications of up to 100 kW projects had to wait for two years.

Applications under the scheme arrived at a steady pace until January in 2020, but more recent applications have dramatically decreased due to the pandemic.

Consumers have possibly started to expect that the deteriorating pandemic situation will lead the authorities to fail to pay for the expense of the project.

Even with changes in the supply chain and prospective rise in investment costs, there is a risk that the guaranteed coverage of the rebate scheme will decrease.

“The increase in the funding of the rebate program would put these concerns to rest. The extra funding will not only expand the rebate budget, helping authorities to maintain the guaranteed coverage against investment cost but also help reduce the waiting time for payments.

“The number of large projects awaiting payments has already started decreasing. Clearly, in the pandemic, the Swiss government with the expanded rebate budget averted the solar PV sector to experience a major blow.”

Somik Das, senior power analyst at GlobalData.