Beijing [China], November 2: During the first phase of the ongoing Canton Fair, China's biggest trade expo, a solar power and energy storage exhibition hall attracted thousands of visitors a day.
Chinese manufacturers sought to capitalise on concerns about restricted shipments of oil through the Strait of Hormuz and global climate change trends by turning overseas demand for reliable power into orders.
Xu Leiping, deputy general manager of sales at Zhejiang Era Solar Technology, said the company had begun selling a newly developed lightweight solar panel designed for balcony use in July. Each panel covers about 1.5 square metres (16.1 square feet) and weighs roughly 2kg (4.4 pounds), compared with about 14kg (30.9 pounds) for a conventional panel the same size. Xu said the lower weight cut installation and hardware costs by 15 to 20 per cent compared with traditional rooftop mounting systems.
"A client from Ghana placed a trial order for 200 units on the spot, without even seeing a physical prototype, brochure or promotional video, simply based on our design deck," Xu said at the fair last month.
Driven by its extensive supply chains and industrial scale, China produces most of the world's energy storage systems, which include solar panels, batteries and control software.
Lin Yanbang, a product manager at Guangzhou-based Felicity Solar, exhibited an industrial and commercial battery cabinet and inverter system for factories, farms and shops that integrates with solar panels and the power grid.
He said one customer, a South African hotel operator, had cut its power bill by 80 per cent after installing the cabinet. "Demand is surging, not just in the Middle East but across Africa and Latin America," Lin said, adding that the planned removal of China's 6 per cent export tax rebate on batteries from the start of next year had spurred exporters to boost shipments before then.
Brisk overseas sales offer Chinese manufacturers a way to offset intense domestic competition driven by excess production capacity.
In the second quarter of this year there were 21 Chinese energy storage engineering and deployment projects overseas, up 75 per cent year on year, according to data from the Jiangsu Photovoltaic Industry Association.
EnergyTrend, a green energy research organisation, reported recently that overseas ordersprimarily from Europe and the Middle East - made up 93 per cent of the contracts for ready-to-install storage systems signed by Chinese suppliers in the third quarter of this year.
Exhibitors at the fair said demand from Asia, Africa and Latin America was translating into orders. Li Jianjun, general manager of Shandong Allgrand New Energy Technology, a battery producer and exporter, said sales were up more than 40 per cent year on year, driven by customised high-voltage storage products tailored for Africa and Southeast Asia.
Li said Allgrand had rushed to complete the second phase of its factory for 300 million yuan and had paused efforts to expand sales in Europe to better focus on faster-growing markets in Africa and Southeast Asia. "In Europe, energy storage is viewed more like a consumer good, a discretionary purchase," he said. "But in Africa and Southeast Asia, power grids are weak, oil prices are crazy high and extreme weather hits all the time. That makes energy storage a total must-have - just to keep daily life and businesses running." Li Ziqin, sales manager at Shenzhen Ruidian Green Energy Technology, said the company's overseas sales were projected to double to roughly 200 million yuan this year, with some markets in the Middle East and the Asia-Pacific region expected to grow by 200 to 300 per cent.
Source: Qatar Tribune
