A sustainable and much larger market for active solar water heating systems is necessary if the sun is to be an important source of energy for water heating in the future.

Objective IEA task 24

To create a larger and sustainable market for active solar water heating systems.

Market growth can be created from the demand and supply sides. This task was focused on the demand side via the creation of large buyer groups. Large volume purchasing can reduce production, marketing and installation costs and stimulate innovation in the development of products with improved cost-performance.

IEA Task 24 began on the 1st of April 1998 and was completed on the 31st of March 2003. The following countries have participated in Task 24: Canada, Belgium, Denmark, The Netherlands, Sweden and Switzerland.

Subtasks

Subtask A: Procurement and Marketing

Objectives

• To raise general interest in active solar thermal solutions.
• To form buyer groups to purchase state-of-the-art and innovative systems.                                  

Subtask B: Creation of Tools

Objectives

• To collect, analyse and summarise experience.
• To create tools to facilitate the creation of buyer groups and the realisation of projects and procurements.
• To define a process for prototype testing and evaluation, using existing methods.

Lessons Learned

Do's and Don'ts - A summary of project lessons learned.

Main Results

Subtask A:

Many buyer group approaches have been developed:

• Local approaches appear to work best
  • Sustainable market approaches like the “Call the Sun” concept have been developed.
  • contracts for approximately 4,200 systems were signed, 3,785 of which were installed.
• A cost reduction of 7-30% was achieved
• External influences, like the abolition of the Danish subsidies, appeared to be important for the results of the Subtask.
• There has been a lot of synergy between the participating countries.
• The Subtask was followed up and the projects running were continued after the end of the Task. Task results were used in the “Soltherm Europe Initiative” project.

Subtask B:

• Task 24 website including the Task 24 manual “Book of Tools/Business Tools”.
• Brochure and background report (published at the beginning of the Task)
  •      “Large Scale Solar Purchasing – A Business Opportunity”.
  •      “Opportunities for Large-Scale Purchase of Active Solar Systems”.
• Evaluation reports of the 1st Round.
• 6 Newsletters.

This website together with a number of reports and materials that can be downloaded from the “Downloads and references” section of this site describe in detail the results of the IEA task 24.