Multi-parameter analysis for the technical and economic assessment of photovoltaic systems in the main European Union countries

In the last decades, the attention to solar energy as a renewable and nonpolluting energy source increased a lot through scientists, private and public institutions. Several efforts are made to increase the diffusion of such a source and to create the conditions making it competitive for the energy market. Particularly, for the photovoltaic (PV) sector, the module efficiency increase, manufacturing cost reduction and a strong public support, through favorable incentive schemes, generates a significant rise in the installed power, exceeding 40GWp in 2010. Although the global trend of the PV sector is positive, differences among countries arise out of local peculiarities and evolutions in the national support policies. This paper investigates such issues focusing on the feasibility analysis of PV solar systems for eight relevant countries in the European Union area, i.e. France, Germany, Greece, Italy, Spain, The Netherlands, Turkey and United Kingdom. A multi-country and multi-parameter comparative analysis, based on the net present value and payback capital budget indices, allows to highlight the conditions most affecting the economic feasibility of PV systems. The national support strategies, along with the most relevant technical, environmental, economic and financial parameters, are the key features included and compared in the analysis. The major results deal with the conditions which make PV systems potentially profitable for each country and installation feature. The national support strategies to the PV sector still play a key role for the most of the considered countries and configurations. Germany, Italy and Spain present the most favorable conditions for a profitable installation of PV systems. Furthermore, the initial investment heavily affects the plant profitability of all the studied scenarios. For such a parameter, significant returns to scale lead to an increase in the installed plant power, so that high rated power plants generally outperform the smaller ones. Such evidences, together with further relevant outcomes which can potentially drive the future investments in the solar PV systems in the European Union, are discussed in this paper.