Solar industry looks at rooftop panels for prospects of turnaround

The battered German makers of solar power panels are looking to 2017 for a change of fortunes as they anticipate more homeowners and businesses installing rooftop systems paired with battery storage, Milena Merten reports in Handelsblatt. Rooftop solar power is often only half as expensive as power from electricity suppliers, and the number of newly installed panels could grow noticeably again in 2017 for the first time in five years, said Carsten Körnig, CEO of the German Solar Industry Association (BSW). With consulting firm PWC forecasting an increase in household power prices to around 34 cents per kilowatt hour by 2020, demand for solar systems paired with storage cells will rise in 2017, Carsten Bovenschen, managing director of Photovoltaics Systems Manufacturer Solarwatt, told Handelsblatt.

Read the article in German here.