How Solar Costs Will Continue to Drop: Incremental Gains Versus Disruptive Step Changes

The cost of crystalline silicon modules has dropped over 60% since 2009, leading to photovoltaic plants becoming a credible source of electricity capacity expansions globally. As Chinese manufacturers have achieved significant cost reductions through economies of scale, vertical integration, and supply chain proximity, core material costs plummeted. These declines in production cost set an optimistic outlook, but future costs will decline at a more incremental rate unless manufacturers move to adopt disruptive technologies. We look what the baseline is for cost reduction, and how kerfless wafering, reduced silver-content metallization, and high efficiency cells can alter the anticipated trend.