An overview of the Solar Photovoltaic policy in the Region of Madeira

The Region of Madeira, being one of the top locations in Portugal in terms of solar exposition, started to bet on micro and mini production photovoltaic systems at the end of the year of 2008, which, environmentally, resulted in a lower number of carbon dioxide emissions from the burning of fossil fuels in thermal plants and, economically, led to the decrease of exterior energy importation. Despite the initial and gradual increase of the investments in these systems, the solar policy has suffered various changes over the past few years by the introduction of new regulations that were responsible for the stagnation of the growth of photovoltaic systems in the Region of Madeira. Taking into account the important role that the solar systems could take on meeting Madeira's goals for renewable energy for 2020, whose deadline is getting closer and have not been achieved yet, the main scope of this paper is to raise awareness about the need for changing the current paradigm of the photovoltaic systems, in order to bring the investment in this field back on track, by identifying the main drawbacks of the current regulation, by demonstrating the environmental and economic benefits of these systems and by studying their performance based on their energy production, which could also help defining the solar policy for the next decades. Overall, it was estimated that the photovoltaic systems in Madeira allowed the emission savings of nearly 22 thousand tons of carbon dioxide as well as the saving of almost 5 million euros from imported fuel, which are relevant values that support the need of adjusting the current instant net-metering regime. Also, the results showed that the places with the best performances are located in the south region of the island and that the efficiency of these installations may rely on the installer company.