The latest ground-mounted PV tender offered by the German Federal Network Agency (Bundesnetzagentur) has awarded the lowest prices since February 2019.
Auction prices awarded ranged from €0.0388/kWh to €0.0495/kWh, with an average volume-weighted price awarded at €0.0476/kWh. This is roughly 6% below the average price awarded in the previous auction round of €0.0505/kWh.
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Interest in German ground-mounted auctions continues to be strong, as it ended up being twice oversubscribed with 524 bids and a total volume of 4,708MW. Previous ground-mounted tenders have had a similar fate end also ended up being oversubscribed.
In the end 242 bids were successful with the German Agency awarding a combined 2,150MW of solar PV capacity in the tender held on 1 December 2024.
“The volume of the bids submitted in this round of ground-mounted solar PV auctions was again significantly higher than the volume up for auction. The continuously high level of competition has led to a further decrease in award prices and thus in public funding for new installations,” said Klaus Müller, president of the Bundesnetzagentur.
Bavaria ended up being the federal state with most capacity awarded – as was the case in previous auctions – with 916MW across 120 projects. It was followed by Schleswig-Holstein with 231MW of solar capacity and 21 winning bids, while Lower Saxony closed the podium with 192MW and 18 winning bids.
For the first time since the passing of Solarpaket I – ‘solar packet I’ in German – last year, the auction implemented the rules on fulfilling a minimum nature conservation criteria which aims to improve the compatibility of ground-mounted PV projects with nature and landscape.
On the other hand, the increase of a project’s maximum capacity to 50MW as well as “solar special installations” were not applied in this tender.
Bids for the next ground-mounted auction will close biddings on 1 March 2025.
Solar PV to assume more responsibility for the overall system
In other related news, the German government recently passed several key energy policies.
One such policy will see solar PV assuming more responsibility for overall electricity generation. This draft law aims to implement measures to address the growing challenges of temporary surplus generation as more renewable capacity become operational.
The changes introduced will better integrate power peaks in the grid with the strengthening of PV systems, while being more cyber-secure. The operation of storage systems will also be simplified.
Moreover, these changes also aim to better handle negative prices, the controllability of renewable energy plants and the controllability of network operators.
Federal minister for economic affairs and climate protection, Robert Habeck, said: “Today’s decisions in the Bundestag are important for the energy transition and the better integration of renewables into the grid – renewables are now coming of age. We would have liked more and there was more on the table, but the package nevertheless secures important achievements of this legislative period in the field of renewable energies.”
