National Solar Energy Initiative Launched To Offer Cheaper Electricity

LONGi, China’s leading solar solutions provider, released its sixth annual corporate sustainability report, highlighting its practices and achievements in ESG.

National Solar Energy Initiative Launched To Offer Cheaper Electricity

LONGi, China’s leading solar solutions provider, released its sixth annual corporate sustainability report, highlighting its practices and achievements in ESG. Pakistani PV market is an important international market for LONGi, poised to become more competitive in the global PV market.

According to Ali Majid, General Manager, Pakistan, LONGi Solar, “Since 2020, LONGi Solar has successfully exported more than 1GW of solar panels to the Pakistani PV market, as a momentous milestone.”

The need for sustainable development has become urgent in Pakistan because it is one of the nations most susceptible to the negative effects of escalating climate change.

The best option to address Pakistan’s power shortage and optimise its energy structure, which is largely based on fossil fuels, while saving foreign exchange needed for energy imports, is photovoltaic power generation.

LONGi produced 290GW worth of photovoltaic products from 2012 to 2022, with a total cumulative output of clean electricity that exceeded 1,148,287 GWh.

It is equivalent to avoiding 536 million tonnes of carbon dioxide emissions, based on the average emission factor for the world’s power grid from the International Energy Agency.

Distributed PV systems, such as rooftop solar installations on residential, commercial, and industrial buildings, have been gaining popularity in Pakistan. Both centralised and distributed PV products have market segment demand.

To encourage distributed generation and enable consumers to reduce their electricity costs by exporting excess power back to the grid, net metering policies and incentives have been introduced, according to Majid.

He continued, “At the same time, our government has been concentrating on the development of large-scale centralised PV projects, including solar parks and utility-scale solar installations. These centralised PV systems contribute to the overall renewable energy capacity of the country and help diversify the energy mix.

Currently, local and foreign players are vying for market share in Pakistan, a country with a booming PV industry. According to statistics from the China Photovoltaic Industry Association (CPIA), photovoltaic module exports from China to Pakistan in 2022 totaled about USD 870 million, with a total installed capacity of 3.2GW, an increase of 54% and 37%, respectively, year over year.

However, for Pakistan, it is crucial to address issues like the foreign exchange gap if it wants to maximise the growth of sustainable industries like photovoltaics.

According to Majid, a sizable foreign exchange gap could make it difficult for the nation to finance its imports, which would include PV products, and could call for actions like foreign exchange controls, import quotas, or changes to import tariffs.

“For instance, currency fluctuations may have an impact on the cost of imported PV products. Majid noted that if Pakistan hopes to truly carve out a niche in the global photovoltaic market with unique competitiveness, the combined force of the three are indispensable.”

A stable economic environment is therefore the basis for ensuring the smooth development of such a sustainable industry. One of the sectors where CPEC has made the most investments, advanced the most quickly, and produced the most impressive results is energy.

“The photovoltaic industry is expanding rapidly on a global scale. Cooperation between China and Pakistan in relevant industries can contribute appropriately to the global effort to combat climate change,” Majid continued.