China's Photovoltaic Industry: From "Bringing Electricity to the Countryside" to Leading the World, Trina Solar's "Chasing Light Journey"

Tech 2024-10-18 15:14:16 Source: Network

China's Photovoltaic Industry: From "Bringing Electricity to the Countryside" to Leading the World, Trina Solar's "Chasing Light Journey"22 years ago, China launched the "Bringing Electricity to the Countryside" project, and a team of engineering technicians from Trina Solar embarked on a journey to the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau, completing the installation of 40 photovoltaic power stations and bringing light to villages without electricity. Gao Jifan, Chairman of Trina Solar, was a member of this team

China's Photovoltaic Industry: From "Bringing Electricity to the Countryside" to Leading the World, Trina Solar's "Chasing Light Journey"

22 years ago, China launched the "Bringing Electricity to the Countryside" project, and a team of engineering technicians from Trina Solar embarked on a journey to the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau, completing the installation of 40 photovoltaic power stations and bringing light to villages without electricity. Gao Jifan, Chairman of Trina Solar, was a member of this team. Today, China's photovoltaic industry has taken a leading position in the world, becoming a "Chinese business card." Recalling this experience on CCTV's "Dialogue" program, Gao Jifan remains filled with emotion: "Photovoltaic power generation has illuminated the dreams of children on the snowy plateau, and I am deeply moved. From the roof of the world to the blue sea, from the desert Gobi to bustling cities, photovoltaics continuously deliver clean electricity to all of humanity, empowering thousands of companies and factories, and illuminating billions of homes."

From "exporting all three components" to "breaking multiple world records," China's photovoltaic industry has also gone through three cyclical adjustments. Now standing at the bottom of the fourth cycle, the industry is accumulating energy and waiting for the turning point to arrive.

Cultivating "Internal Strength": Constructing a Digitalized Smart Energy System

Gao Jifan frankly acknowledges that the photovoltaic industry is currently in a trough, but leading companies have learned lessons and gained experience from past trials, gradually building a strategy that can effectively navigate cycles. Trina Solar, for example, has achieved higher levels of growth in scale, profitability, strategy, and industry form after each cycle.

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Gao Jifan believes that the trough period of the industry cycle is also a key moment for companies to strengthen their own capabilities through technological innovation. Trina Solar's R&D expenditure in the first half of 2024 reached 2.71 billion yuan, accounting for over 6% of its revenue, and its average annual R&D expenditure in the past three years has been approximately4.2 billion yuan, ranking among the top in the industry.

Why choose to increase R&D expenses during a period of industry downturn and compressed profit margins? Gao Jifan explains: "It is precisely R&D that allows our technology products to reach a higher level, become more competitive, and enable us to gain greater initiative in the future market."

For Trina Solar, building a digitalized smart energy system is a major R&D focus at this stage. In 2023, Trina Solar's revenue from energy storage and other fields already accounted for one-third of its total revenue, signifying the accelerated formation of a new "integrated photovoltaics and energy storage" model. Trina Solar is transforming into a comprehensive smart energy solutions company, aiming to drive rapid development in the fields of centralized and distributed smart energy, energy storage systems, and intelligent tracking brackets, with the goal of increasing the proportion of revenue from these fields to over 50% in the future. This move aims to achieve a dual-wheel drive model of company products and solutions, simultaneously establishing dual-core competitiveness in photovoltaics and energy storage.

Building an Ecosystem: Complementary Strengths to Welcome the Industry 3.0 Era

Founded in 1997, Trina Solar has witnessed the rise of China's photovoltaic industry. Gao Jifan points out that in the 1.0 era of the photovoltaic industry, companies mainly developed in their respective areas of strength, with close cooperation between upstream and downstream players. With the advent of the 2.0 era, companies have leaned towards vertical integration, intensifying market competition.

He believes that against the backdrop of the industry 2.0 era, the industry should build a new ecosystem of collaborative development, exploring new cooperation models such as equity cooperation, industry chain cooperation, and innovation cooperation, complementing each other's strengths to jointly welcome the 3.0 era, achieving shared benefits and win-win cooperation.

"Cooperation" is one of the key topics in the development of the photovoltaic industry. In recent years, Trina Solar's industry cooperation has entered the "fast lane." As early as 17 years ago, Trina Solar established a strategic partnership with Tongwei, followed by continued deepening of industry chain cooperation with the company. In July of this year, Trina Solar even joined hands with industry leaders such as Jiegao Weiye and Juhe Materials to jointly hold shares in Jiangsu Qunchuang Photovoltaic Technology Co., Ltd.

Gao Jifan says: "We are joining forces with companies along the industry chain to jointly create a new platform for collaborative innovation. Through this platform, leading companies across the entire industry chain will be able to share intellectual property rights and build a solid moat, thereby propelling technology and products to higher levels."

China's Photovoltaic Industry: Leading the Global Renewable Energy Industry Development

The International Energy Agency's recent 2024 "Renewable Energy Report" shows that China's photovoltaic power generation will lead the global renewable energy industry over the next six years. Fatih Birol, Executive Director of the International Energy Agency, states that if two words were to be used to summarize the global renewable energy development trend over the next six years, they would be: China, Photovoltaic.

Gao Jifan emphasizes that China's photovoltaic professionals have been "chasing the light" for many years, driving China's photovoltaic industry from "exporting all three components" to "leading the world." Looking towards the future, Trina Solar expects to continue exploring the path of high-quality development of China's photovoltaic industry together with its industry peers, contributing to energy transformation and sustainable development in China and globally.

Summary

From "bringing electricity to the countryside" to leading the world, Trina Solar's "chasing light journey" reflects the development path of China's photovoltaic industry and demonstrates the company's active efforts to drive the entire industry towards a healthier development trajectory. In the future, as global energy transformation accelerates, China's photovoltaic industry is poised to enter a broader market space, and Trina Solar will continue to leverage its strengths to contribute to achieving sustainable development goals.

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