China’s National Energy Administration (NEA) announced on Friday August 23 that the country installed around 11.4 gigawatts (GW) of solar photovoltaic (PV) capacity in the first half of this year, bringing the country’s cumulative total to 185.59 GW, up 20% from the same period in 2018.
Around 6.82 GW of the new capacity was accounted for by large scale PV plants with the 4.58 GW balance coming from distributed generation arrays, according to the statistics. Northwest China boasted the largest share of new PV plants – with 3.43 GW of new grid-connected capacity – followed by the north of the huge nation, with 3.29 GW; and the east, with 2.28 GW.
Among the total, distributed solar capacity account for 55.02 GW, up 31% on the year to year, and centralised solar takes up 130.58 GW, up 16% on the year to year.
After solar PV installation capacity rose by a record 53 GW in 2017, China decided last year to slow down the pace of new project approvals, with the government concerned about insufficient grid capacity and struggling to pay a subsidy backlog that had reached 140 billion RMB ($19.74 billion). The solar installation growth in China slowed down from a year ago as the country cut down the subsidy.
