Photovoltaic industry is an important branch of new energy. The new energy industry mainly includes photovoltaic, wind power, nuclear power, biomass, hydrogen and other branches. In 2021, China's total energy consumption will increase by 5.2%, while wind power and photovoltaic power generation will account for 11.7% of total electricity consumption, exceeding 10% for the first time.
One: what is photovoltaic
Photovoltaic power generation (PV) is a form of clean energy that converts solar energy into electricity using solar cells based on the principle of "photogenerating volt" effect. According to the transmission mode, it is mainly divided into independent, grid-connected and distributed photovoltaic power generation. Because photovoltaic power generation equipment is to convert solar energy into electricity, its green, environmental characteristics are strongly supported by various countries, and in recent decades, rapid development. With "double carbon" becoming a global proposition, countries continue to release favorable policies, global photovoltaic installed demand is expected to maintain high prosperity in the next few years, driving the photovoltaic industry to accelerate development. At present, there are many companies related to the photovoltaic industry in the NEW Third Board and THE Beijing Stock Exchange market, and the photovoltaic industry chain is one of the key points for investors to learn. Therefore, we will start from the key links of the industrial chain to introduce the status quo of the segmentation industry, core competitive factors, etc., to help investors read the annual report of photovoltaic companies from a business perspective, and improve their investment decision-making ability.
Two: the composition of the photovoltaic industry
Photovoltaic is mainly divided into photovoltaic power station operation and photovoltaic manufacturing two fields. Photovoltaic manufacturing is divided into two parts: main industrial chain and auxiliary industrial chain. In the main industrial chain of photovoltaic manufacturing, industrial silicon, silicon materials and silicon wafers are in the upper reaches of the industry, while cells and photovoltaic modules are in the middle. Among them, silicon material, silicon wafer, battery and photovoltaic module are the key links. Photovoltaic auxiliary industry chain is mainly composed of photovoltaic auxiliary materials and photovoltaic equipment, of which auxiliary materials include film, glass, welding tape and other consumables, equipment includes silicon chip equipment, cell chip equipment and other photovoltaic equipment needed for the production of silicon chip, cell chip. The following will focus on each important link of the main industrial chain of photovoltaic manufacturing.
A: Silicon link
Silicon material link is a link that processes industrial silicon into high purity polysilicon by chemical purification and deep processing. The cost and supply of silicon materials directly determine the cost and supply of products in the follow-up links of the photovoltaic industry chain, and it has a high position in the photovoltaic value chain. Silicon material link has three characteristics: relatively stable technology, long expansion period and low elasticity of productivity. At present, most silicon manufacturers use the modified Siemens process, which is the most mature and widely used process. At the same time, due to high technical barriers and large capital investment, it takes longer for the silicon link to expand capacity than the downstream link. Therefore, in the context of high photovoltaic demand and prosperity in 2021, silicon materials continue to rise, and the profitability level of all links of the photovoltaic industry chain shows great fluctuations. Therefore, silicon materials is one of the links that need to pay attention to tracking the photovoltaic industry.
B: Silicon wafer
Silicon wafer is the downstream link of silicon material, the general production process is to cast silicon ingot silicon material, and then cut into pieces, processing into silicon wafer. At present, it is mainly classified into monocrystalline silicon wafer and polycrystalline silicon wafer, among which monocrystalline silicon wafer has basically replaced polycrystalline silicon wafer with its advantages of high conversion efficiency. In the future, as the photovoltaic industry chain continues to reduce costs and increase efficiency, the silicon wafer link will be driven by the demand for cost reduction, and the trend of large-size and thin silicon wafers will become more and more obvious. In recent years, the market concentration of the silicon wafer industry has been increasing, and the current photovoltaic silicon wafer industry presents a stable duopoly pattern, with the 2021 production capacity of Longji and CMC accounting for 64%. Capacity structure and cost control ability are the key indexes to measure the competitiveness of manufacturers in this link.
C: Battery segment
In the cell segment, silver wires are added to the surface of the silicon wafer to make it capable of photoelectric conversion. Photoelectric conversion efficiency is the core profit point of the cell link, which has fast technology iteration. At present, there are two main types of photovoltaic cell technology: P-type and N-type. P type battery is dominated by PERC technology, which occupies an important position in the battery market at present. Compared with P type battery, N-type battery has the advantages of high conversion efficiency and slow decay rate, which is the core direction of future technology development, mainly including TOPCon and HJT.
D: Photovoltaic module
Photovoltaic module is the end of photovoltaic products, in the middle and lower reaches of the photovoltaic industry. The component part forms a component and is used as a power supply by connecting multiple batteries in series, parallel connection and tight packaging. Component industry is characterized by low concentration and intense competition due to relatively low technical barriers and light assets. Component technology changes less, the core competitiveness depends on channel, brand and supply chain management ability. Because the component link directly faces the terminal customer, the enterprise holds the customer resource, the current component leader is the integration manufacturer or is expanding the integration.