The 27 member states of the European Union (EU) had around 4,500 MW worth of Chinese solar PV module capacity coming in during December 2023, according to the EUPD Research. This $612.4 million transaction comprised the sale of 8.3 million PV module items.
After EU module imports from China had more than halved over the course of last year, after they peaked at over 10 GW in March 2023, numbers slightly increased in December by around 500 MW to 4.5 GW month-on-month. That's still less than the EU's average monthly deployments last year of 4.66 GW, based on SolarPower Europe's data (see EU Solar PV Installations Reach 56 GW).
Referring to PV module export data from China for December 2023, EUPD said 87 GW worth of PV modules were exported to the EU in 2023.
However, InfoLink Consulting said Europe was the largest importer of Chinese modules during 11M/2023 with 96.4 GW aggregate capacity. InfoLink had expected European demand to slow down in December going by the high levels of module inventory in its warehouses (see China Shipped 17.7 GW Solar Panels In Nov. 2023).
"If the exports were supposed to follow exactly the pattern of 2022, the December export number would have been less than 4 GW. However, we now know that in December 2023 and compared to November 2023, 1 million more PV items have been exported to the EU-27. A month over month reduction of the PV value of the export products was spotted, indicating a further PV module price decrease in December," said EUPD in a LinkedIn post.
Local media in China referred to China Customs data to report 2023 Chinese exports for silicon wafers, cells and modules reached a total of over $49 billion, compared to $51.8 billion in 2022. Its total PV export value to Europe declined by $3.5 billion even as the continent accounted for 41.14% of Chinese exports last year.