The German parliament has approved “Solarpaket 1,” a policy package that includes higher feed-in tariffs for commercial and industrial (C&I) solar projects and new measures related to the size of eligible installations in large-scale solar auctions.
The German parliament has approved the Solarpaket 1 measures to support the PV sector. The new legislation passed with 384 votes in favor, 79 against, and 200 abstentions.
The law includes significant improvements for the C&I segment. In the future, such installations will be eligible for feed-in tariffs that will be €0.015 ($0.016) higher per kilowatt-hour than current tariff levels.
It will also become easier for people to deploy PV balcony systems and start energy communities. In addition, the new law increases the limit for solar projects from 20 MW to 50 MW in tenders for large-scale installations.
The new provisions do not include a “resilience bonus,” which some government coalition parties demanded to support domestic value chains. The proposed bonus consisted of an additional reward for solar project developers who would use PV components made in Europe.
Germany reached around 88.44 GW of installed PV capacity at the end of February. The nation's new solar additions hit 14.5 GW in 2023, 7.19 GW in 2022, 5.26 GW in 2021, 3.94 GW in 2019, 2.96 GW in 2018, and 1.75 GW in 2017.
