エネルギー

2023年の再生可能エネルギー崩壊

公開日 2023年10月17日

更新日 2026年6月3日

著者

Jonathan Schramm

Securities.io を Google の優先ソースに追加

ここ数か月、再生可能エネルギーへの投資家はかなり厳しい状況に直面しています。株価の急落、オフショア風力入札の中止、減損が相まって、かなり落胆した雰囲気が漂っています。

では何が起きたのでしょうか？なぜでしょうか？そして今後はどのようになる可能性があるのでしょうか？

残酷な調整

The largest clean energy ETF, QCLN, has suffered an almost 50% decline since its peak in 2021.

QCLN 価格チャート

This correction is even more brutal in some sub-sectors of the clean energy industry, with the situation especially painful for the wind industry. For example, the leading offshore wind operator Orsted (D2G.DE ) stock (DNNGY) is now priced below its 2017 IPO level (excluding dividends). The largest wind turbine manufacturer, Vestas (VWDRY), is back to its 2008 price level (excluding dividends).

再生可能エネルギーがエネルギーミックスの中で大きな割合を占め、エネルギーシステムの未来と広く見なされていたにもかかわらず、多くの投資家は驚きました。

原因の収束

嵐のような風

The first problem in the renewable energy sector started with a profit warning from Siemens Energy (ENR.SW ) (ENR.DE ) in 2023年6月. Quality problems in its Gamesa branch meant that some turbine engines would need to be replaced much sooner than expected, hurting the company’s profits. This led to a sudden drop of 36% in the stock price.

さらに悪いニュースが続き、2023年8月にOrstedが米国プロジェクトでの問題を警告し、一部は完全に中止せざるを得ない可能性が出てきました。

This created a wave of concern in the industry, with many offshore auctions for wind projects meeting little enthusiasm or even failing entirely, like in the UK in 2023年9月.

インフレーション

Besides technological issues at Siemens, inflation is the root cause of the sudden wave of troubles in the wind industry.

Projects calculated a few years ago are now facing increasing costs on labor and equipment, as well as supply chain damage by the pandemic. So, what made sense economically in 2020 or 2021 might not make sense anymore in 2023.

金利上昇

Compounding on the inflation issue, central banks all over the world have raised interest rates to put inflation under control. This surprised market participants and industrial companies, after 3 decades of declining rates, marked only by temporary and short-lived spikes.

出典: Chartstorm

これは、再生可能エネルギーのような巨額の資本集約型プロジェクトが、前の十年に比べてはるかに高い資金調達コストに直面していることを意味します。

This can also hurt companies that need to refinance their debt load, a common situation for fast-growing renewable companies. As a result, July to 2023年9月 saw a record outflow of capital from clean energy ETFs.

This is a more generalized problem affecting the energy sector, including solar farms, utilities, and solar panel manufacturers.

電力網の飽和と蓄電

While the previous factors are mostly out of the control of the industry, one additional growing issue is starting to hurt renewable energy. Power grids have been designed around fossil fuel-based power generation (and hydro + nuclear power). This means that the intermittency of renewables can become a growing issue in the larger part of the grid they represent.

これはユーティリティ規模のエネルギー蓄電で緩和されるはずです。しかし、この分野への投資が遅れ、時折再生可能エネルギーが無駄になる事態が生じています。同様に、風や日射が弱い期間には、蓄電容量が不足するため、電力網運営者はガスや石炭といった化石燃料に頼らざるを得ません。

この問題は是正されつつあり、2021年から2022年にかけて蓄電容量は75%増加しました。しかし、解決までには数年かかり、再生可能エネルギーセクター全体に影響を与え続ける可能性があります。

出典: IEA

今後は？

懸念の壁

Some issues are temporary but serious in the short term. The durability of older models of wind turbines might not be as good as initially forecasted. This is for sure true for the Siemens Gamesa turbines, but this is now a concern for the rest of the industry as well.

Grid saturation and the mismatch between demand and production of electricity is likely to stay for a few years until energy storage has caught up with the renewable revolution. This might have different effects for different sub-sectors:

グリーンユーティリティは、生産を抑制したりエネルギー蓄電への投資を増やす必要があるため、数年間は利益が減少する可能性があります。
風力タービンや太陽光パネルの製造業者は、ターゲットとする市場を戦略的に選ぶ必要があります。
エネルギー蓄電企業（運営者および製造者）は、前例のないブームを経験する可能性があります。

None of these problems are unsolvable, but they will not be solved overnight either.

長期的なコスト上昇

The important thing to consider is that energy generation of あらゆるkind is a capital-intensive industry. This is true for renewable, as well as for fossil fuels or nuclear.

したがって、使用される技術に関わらず、今後の電力生成はよりコストがかかるようになると考えられます。少なくとも、インフレーションと金利上昇が新たな常態である限りです。

Other investing sectors were also damaged by this macroeconomic environment; for example, the entire US utility sector is down to a 3.5-year low in 2023年10月. Even “safe” investment vehicles like US bonds “have suffered the steepest decline in history,” according to Bank of America (BAC ).

This is true in the fossil fuel industry as well. Shale oil is not growing much in its production, preferring to keep a close eye on rising costs and favoring returning capital to shareholders. There are now just 504 operating rigs in the US, compared to 1,609 in 2014 at the peak of the shale boom.

The higher costs are likely to last, as more expensive energy (of all kinds) will likely contribute to keeping inflation high. Other factors like geopolitical chaos (as sadly illustrated by the wars in Ukraine and now Israel), deglobalization, and unionization will also be contributing to keeping inflation higher for longer.

継続的な技術進歩

The renewable revolution was made possible thanks to continuous solar and wind technology progress. This has caused a collapse of renewable energies’ costs, making them competitive with fossil fuels and nuclear, with solar costs down 90% in 10 years.

現在、技術によるコスト低下の傾向は、インフレーションによるコスト上昇で相殺されています。しかし、これは再生可能技術の進歩が止まったことを意味するわけではありません。

For example, the most innovative companies with cheaper or more efficient solar panels, like First Solar (FSLR ) (FSLR), could be among the big winners in the sector in the long term.