South AFrica has bought 11 GW of solar panels from China in the past three years
Chinese solar panel exports to South Africa shot up in 2023. And even though national loadshedding effectively ended early in 2024, the demand for solar panels has remained high. In 2025 alone, more than 6-million solar panels were imported into South Africa from China, according to energy think-tank Ember’s data.
In three years, an estimated 11 000 MW of solar PV capacity has been imported from China. It has become more about keeping the cost of electricity down than simply keeping the lights on. China totally dominates the global solar photovoltaic market and it has been instrumental in bringing down the price of solar PV.
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