South Africa World’s Most Attractive Emerging Solar Energy Country

Global information company IHS has released an analysis which paints South Africa as the world’s most attractive emerging country for solar energy, pointing to the country’s target of 8.4 GW of solar PV capacity by 2030 combined with the country’s successful large-scale tendering process in moving towards that goal.

In IHS’s Emerging PV Markets Attractiveness Index, South Africa scored 66 out of 100 for the fourth quarter of 2013, 17 points ahead of any of the competitors.

“South Africa has consolidated its position as a growth market for PV by cultivating a policy environment stable enough to attract financing from commercial banks,” said Josefin Berg, senior PV analyst at IHS.

The IHS Index ranks the attractiveness of PV markets in emerging countries for investors, developers, and manufacturers across four key areas: macroeconomic climate, potential market size, project profitability and pipeline maturity. As can be seen in the table below, South Africa ranked well in each of the four categories.

Thailand and Turkey round out the top three, closely followed by Romania and Mexico, all of whom are receiving focus from investors interested in their growing markets. Berg points to Thailand’s adder scheme as one of the key points of interest for investors in that country, and Turkey’s soaring power demand and prices, established PV incentives, and relatively low country risk as critical for investors.