China Province Has Too Much Solar Power for Lunar New Year

(Bloomberg) -- China’s biggest region for solar power is ordering households to switch off rooftop panels during the Lunar New Year holiday so they don’t overwhelm the grid during a period of low demand.

Shandong province is forcing low-voltage distributed solar generation to stop operating from Jan. 19 to 28, Solarbe reported, citing a notice issued by local authorities. Electricity demand typically drops during the holiday as factories shut and workers return home, while some coal power plants need to keep operating because they also provide heat to keep homes warm in the winter. 

The coastal province famous for its Tsingtao beer and home to more people than Germany is also China’s leader in solar power capacity. Of the nearly 40 gigawatts of panels it had as of last September, more than 70% were so-called distributed solar, which includes ones perched on roofs of homes and office buildings. Shandong has issued notices to curb distributed solar generation every Lunar New Year since 2018. 

Distributed systems have boomed in China, especially since a supportive government program was announced in the summer of 2021, accounting for more than half of all newly added solar capacity in the country last year. But they may be reaching a saturation point in Shandong and other places where growth was particularly dramatic, as grids are having difficulty making full use of the power due to its intermittent nature and a lack of energy storage systems.

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