The Federal Network Agency of Germany (Bundesnetzagentur) has concluded its latest 1.6 GW solar auction with a total of 124 accepted bids, discovering a lowest tariff of €0.054 (~$0.059)/kWh in the process.

The highest awarded bid value was €0.067 (~$0.073)/kWh and the average volume-weighted surcharge value was €0.065 (~$0.071)/kWh.

The ceiling tariff for the auction for the ground-mounted solar projects was set at €0.074 (~$0.081)/kWh.

The tender received an overwhelming response, with the bid volume coming up to 1.67 GW.

The total capacity of 1.61 GW was auctioned is one-third of the bid volume of 5.85 GW to be awarded in the calendar year 2023.

Anumar Solar Park, ENERPARC AG, Fronteris Energie, GFG-Solar, and EnBW Solar were among the bidders in the auction.

The state of Bayern received the most number of bids, followed by Baden-Württemberg and Mecklenburg-Vorpommern.

Last month, Germany’s auction for installing 191 MW of rooftop solar projects was oversubscribed by 79%. The auction garnered substantial interest, receiving a total of 155 bids amounting to 342 MW. The bids spanned a range from €0.088 (~$0.096)/kWh to €0.108 (~$0.0117)/kWh, all of which fell below the ceiling tariff limit of €0.113 (~$0.123)/kWh.

The lackluster reaction to solar and wind auctions in 2022 led the German Parliament (Bundestag) to grant the Federal Network Agency the authority to increase the tariff cap by as much as 25%. As a result, a ceiling tariff of €0.1125 (~$0.12) per kWh for rooftop solar installations and €0.0735 ($0.078) per kWh for wind project bids in 2023.

Germany installed 3.3 GW of solar capacity in the second quarter of 2023, a substantial growth of 94% year-over-year from 1.7 GW added in the same period last year. Bayern led the installations with 1.6 MW installed during the year, followed by Nordrhein-Westfalen with 971.3 MW and Baden-Württemberg with 832.7 MW.