China connected 15.13 GW of new PV systems to the grid in 2015. That's a year-on-year growth of 43% over the 10.6 GW added in 2015. But it falls short of the 17.8 GW originally planned.
According to the latest figures released by the Chinese National Energy Administration (NEA), total PV capacity installed in the country has increased to 43.18 GW. This includes 37.12 GW of PV power plants, while the remaining 6.06 GW comes from distributed systems. China's 15 GW is more than a quarter of the world's newly installed capacity in 2015.
Energy consultancy Mercom Capital Group LLC had predicted 17 GW of solar installations for China in 2015, and had upped its earlier forecast of 54.4 GW of global solar installations in 2015 to 57.4 GW, after China connected 5 GW of PV only in the first quarter.
Only one month ago, end of December, the NEA announced that the country has set a goal of 15 GW new PV installations in 2016 (see China plans 15 GW new solar). China had a target of achieving 100 GW of solar energy by 2022, but increased the goal to 150 GW in its 13th 5-Year Plan.