Sweden
PV technology status and prospects
Maria Malmkvist, Swedish National Energy Administration
Cristian Andersson, Elforsk-Swedish Electrical Utilities' R&D Company		 home > annual reports > annual report 2000 >

General Framework

Photo 1: Grid-connected 7,3 kWp wall mounted thin film system, Gothenburg Energy Ltd. Office building in Gothenburg, Sweden [Photo: Gothenburg Energy Ltd., 2000] The Swedish National Energy Administration is the national authority on issues regarding the supply and use of energy. Its main task is to implement the energy policy programme approved by the Swedish Parliament in the spring of 1997. The aim of the programme is to establish an ecologically as well as economically sustainable energy system. One part of this is to promote the use of renewable energy sources such as hydropower, wind power and PV.

Elforsk - the Swedish Electrical Utilities' R&D Company is owned by the Association of Swedish power producers, the Swedish electricity suppliers and the Swedish national grid. Elforsk is to conduct efficient R&D of importance to generation, transmission, distribution and utilization of electricity.

The Swedish electricity supply system mainly consists off nuclear and hydropower. Wind power is still a small, but growing, part of the energy system. Energy from PV is negligible. There are a few grid-connected PV systems but the main volume is the domestic off-grid sector, typically recreational applications like holiday cottages. Today there are no market initiatives or regularly subsidies directly promoting PV in Sweden. However the National Energy Administration takes part in the discussion regarding the directive on the promotion of electricity from renewable sources in the internal electricity market within the EU and is also involved in developing a future system for promotion of renewable energy through green certificates. The government provides funding for cost-shared Research, Development & Demonstration projects as outlined below.
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National Programme

In 1996 a joint decision together with the Swedish Foundation for Strategic Environmental Research, MISTRA, was taken to start a new and merged programme for R&D on PV. The programme is called Ångström Solar Center (ÅSC) and is located at Uppsala University.

In the beginning of September 2000 the programme was evaluated with a very good outcome both regarding the scientific level and the industrial relevance. The scientific platform and activities were judged excellent and at the international research frontier. For example, the Thin Film Solar Cells activities have led to a new world efficiency record for a module.

In November 2000, based on the results from the evaluations and a revized programme plan, the Swedish National Energy Administration and MISTRA decided to support Ångström Solar Center, phase II, until the end of year 2004 with a total financing of 80 000 000 SEK, approximately USD 8 million.

The overall goal of the Ångström Solar Center programme is to contribute to a sustainable energy system in the future, preferably contributing to the economic competitiveness of Sweden. The approach is to start from an existing strong scientific platform and evolve progressively toward applications by scale-up, prototype manufacturing, and eventually, commercialization in three subprograms:

Furthermore the Swedish national co-financed programme on PV systems and applications, managed by Elforsk, has been launched for a new three-years period (2000-2002). It primarily involves the energy and building industry. Architects represent new partners. This programme is complementary and to some extent linked to the Ångström Solar Center R&D programme. The main task is to perform development, objective analysis and information dissemination concerning technical issues, costs and applications of PV systems.
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Research

The Ångström Solar Center R&D programme embraces three project areas as mentioned earlier. The main challenge for Phase II is to progress further along the line toward applications by scale-up, prototype manufacturing, and spin-off toward commercialization. The Thin Film Solar Cells project is technologically the one closest realization. The other projects should move along the same line. The Smart Windows project is currently ahead of the Nanostructured Solar Cells project in this respect, but the latter has interesting potential for niche applications.

The technical achievements from CIGS thin film solar cell research in Sweden include cell conversion efficiencies up to 17%, at the time making the breakthrough towards truly high performance thin film solar cells. Recently, a sub module consisting of nine cells in series and having 16,6% efficiency was fabricated. This is the present world record for a solar cell module of any thin film material.

This has resulted from R&D efforts where the focus has been on CIGS film fabrication by co-evaporation. A large area deposition concept, suitable for mass fabrication, has been invented and patented. Performance and cost goals shall be achieved by utilizing processes and materials that minimize the impact on the environment. The aim is that the CIGS technology should be brought to a state where performance and manufacturability make it ready for large-scale commercialization.
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Development

The national programme on PV systems and applications is focused on system integration. It has in somewhat switched from energy perspective towards PV in buildings perspective. The vision is that the market for PV will expand from stand-alone applications to power production through grid-connected building integrated and other decentralized PV systems. This expansion however depends on PV systems and applications knowledge among the future industrial partners in the PV area. To fulfil the vision and contribute to the reduction of the critical PV system costs the programme goal is to enhance knowledge about PV as energy source as well as a building component, identify possible applications of PV and rise the commercial awareness concerning PV systems.

The programme includes coverage of the rapid international development concerning PV systems in general and for grid-connected building integrated PV systems in particular. The programme does provide a basis for international exchange, such as the participation in the IEA  PVPS Programme.

Photo 2: Installation of PV-module for cathodic corrosion protection of power pylons. There are approximately 50 000 pylons of this type in Sweden [Photo: Märit Forssander, The Swedish Corrosion Institute 1998]. The programme is in progress to establish a rational evaluation process for Swedish PV installations through:

Effort concerning niche applications is focused on cathodic corrosion protection of power pylons. Previous results indicate that it could be a cost-effective application. The potential market is large and not limited to Sweden and further steps to realize applicable system configurations are undertaken.

A promising concept for increasing the amount of irradiation and thus lowering the cost of PV systems is the use of reflectors. Development of reflector and hybrid-concepts for PV-systems are important efforts within the program. In addition, interesting synergies with Ångström Solar Center CIGS-modules has been identified and implemented through tests with prototype modules.

The interest from the Swedish building industry is focused on building integrated PV systems. Recent program activities includes conceptual studies of criteria for building permission for integration in existing buildings, development of tools for physical planning concerning design and structure of the built environment and information and education concerning BIPV.
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Demonstration

A number of niche applications have been demonstrated. Demonstration of grid-connected PV systems is at present limited to a few smaller systems.

The awareness of PV in buildings has started to rise through demonstrations such as Älmhult (IKEA), Gothenburg, Kristianstad and The Nordic Ark. In the near future we are to see further developed demonstrations of PV in buildings. One example is the result of an environmental competition concerning Hammarby Sjöstad, Stockholm's largest residential building project. The winning contribution (see Photo 3), will be realized.

Photo 3: Sickla kaj by NCC AB (Architect: White Arkitekter). Winning contribution to the environmental competition announced by the City of Stockholm. NCC ABs will install a total of 420 square meters of PV in their Hammarby Sjöstad projects [Picture: White Arkitekter, 2000]. As PV is a promising energy source for the future, schools are a good base for implementing the technology. EU/Alterner has approved a Nordic PV School Programme. It will hopefully lead to several grid-connected PV systems on Swedish schools. The installations, together with the linking of schools in several EU countries, introduce the students to PV technology and will be a good complement to the current Swedish PV system programme.
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Implementation

In Sweden, there are no general subsides for PV, contrary to other renewable energy sources like solar thermal, wind and biomass. The Swedish policies, which indirectly could promote the use of PV power systems, are taxes and fees related to energy production and environmental protection. The current levels of these taxes and fees, at current PV system prices, are however too low to have an impact on the PV market in Sweden. Instead, in the current pre-commercial state of PV, new installations of significant size would most likely be considered as a demonstration system and receive support from governmental funds. With this funding the public support can be up to 50% of the innovative part of a demonstration project.

The fact that Sweden has a free electricity market with very low electricity prices, poor economy for PV projects and consequently low interest from private investors are high barriers. Since PV is a long term sustainable renewable energy technology the general view on PV in Sweden is positive and the interest from the industry has increased. The solid and steady progress, which has occurred during the recent years, has been noted and hopefully it will develop over the coming years. However PV will probably not be utilized for large-scale electricity power generation within the next 5-10 years.
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Industry Status

The PV industry in Sweden consists primarily of two companies, Gällivare Photovoltaic (GPV) and Fortum Advanced Energy System Sweden AB (Fortum AES).

GPV - Gällivare Photovoltaic is the only producer of photovoltaic modules in Sweden. The company is situated in Gällivare, north of the Arctic Circle in Lappland and is owned by The SolarWorld AG (70%), BP Solarex (25%) and the GPV management (5%). The company purchases solar cells, both monocrystalline and multi-crystalline cells, on the world market and produces modules. The process steps include cell testing, soldering, lamination, attachment of junction box, framing and module testing. GPV offers a wide range of products of standard modules in sizes from 40 to 160 Watts. The company can also manufacture custom-designed modules and laminates for building integration and other special applications.

Fortum AES is designing, marketing and selling products and systems based on PV modules. System controllers and the majority of solar modules are of own design. Fortum AES has experience in consumer applications, industrial applications, rural electrification and on-grid distributed systems. NAPS Systems Oy, a company in the Fortum Group, owns the company.
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Market Development

The main volume of the Swedish PV market is the domestic-off-grid sector. The total installed power during 1999 was 214 kWp, which is slightly less than in 1997 and 1998. One grid-connected system was installed during 1999, a 10,1 kWp. By the end of 1999 the total cumulative installed capacity in Sweden was about 2,6 MWp. The main part of the system components is imported and the dominant fraction, around 90%, of the Swedish module production is exported. The module production is approximately 1 MWp/year (50% monocrystalline and 50% multicrystalline).
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Future Outlook

The high quality research and development that is carried out at Ångström Solar Center will continue another 4 years. The ÅSC programme is highly relevant for the Swedish National Energy Administration since it deals with important issues for a future sustainable energy system and potential commercial ventures beneficial to Sweden.

In the near future we are probably to see new initiatives bringing PV closer to a commercial market. These initiatives could be realized in cooperation between traditional and partly new but essential actors, such as architects and building companies, which can make a contribution to market development driven by other factors than energy prices.

This, together with enhanced user oriented knowledge, through the national co-financed programme on PV systems and applications, will form the basis for future initiatives in Sweden.
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Further reading about Sweden

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