Projects Building Integrated Photovoltaics Markets (BIPV) Reaching $7.5 Bn in 2015

Wednesday 5 December 2012, Amsterdam

Glen Allen, VA:  Industry analyst today published its latest BIPV projections in a report titled, “Building-Integrated Photovoltaics Markets -2012.”  This report estimates that the entire BIPV market already generates around $2.1 bn ($US) today and that this figure will grow to $7.5 bn by 2015.  Much of this growth will come at the expense of conventional solar panels as the better economics and aesthetics of BIPV make their impact on end users.  This new report also expects new builds to contribute 63 percent of all BIPV revenues in 2015.

About the Report:

This report provides highly granular eight-year forecast of the worldwide BIPV market with breakouts for PV roofing overlays, BIPV tiles and shingles, wall-attached BIPV, BIPV siding, BIPV curtain walls, BIPV/window hybrids and futuristic monolithically integrated BIPV products.   The projections are presented in both value ($ millions) and volume (MW and area covered).

Additional breakouts are provided for types of building in which BIPV is installed (residential, commercial, industrial, etc.), whether the BIPV installation is a retrofit or a new build, and the type of absorber material it uses.  In addition, we project the nations and regions that will generate the most BIPV revenues;  this new report expects Europe to be the largest market for BIPV throughout the period covered in these forecasts.

More from the report:

According to this new report, the market for BIPV roofing products will reach $2.5 bn by 2015; a four-fold increase in revenues compared to 2012.  But, there will be a profound change in how the BIPV revenues are generated over this relatively short period.  Today almost 80 percent of the dollars from BIPV roofing comes from simple BIPV overlay products.  By 2015, analysis foresee that specialized BIPV tiles and shingles will have become widely available offering much better value propositions than any current BIPV products; As a result, these BIPV tiles and shingles will account for 60 percent of BIPV roofing product revenues.

The report also provides projections for BIPV walling, a sector that has barely been touched by BIPV today.  Despite this, analysis foresee this sector taking off in the next few years as zero-energy buildings and multistory office buildings find that roof-based PV is not capable of generating sufficient power for their needs.  According to the new report projections, this could lead to an $830 million market for wall-based BIPV by 2015.  However, analysis think that specialized wall-based BIPV products will be slow to take off and 62 percent of the revenues in the wall sector will come from existing products that have been “versioned” for a walling market.

Although BIPV glass sales are expected to reach $4.2 bn by 2015, analysis believe that much of this relatively large figure will be generated by the high-cost of the architectural glass that underpins BIPV glass.  However, analysis believe that there are good opportunities in the glass sector for monolithically integrating PV and building fabric functionalities and projects that by 2015, $375 m will be generated by fully integrated BIPV glass products.