Abstract: Based on patent documents related to solar building published in the China Patent Retrieval System (CPRS), distribution of the proprietary technologies, volume of patent applications, China domestic applicants and supply chain of Building Integrated Photovoltaic (BIPV) industry are analyzed. Solar building technology development is found to be particularly rapid in recent years with industrial companies dominating the research and development.We show that the Photovoltaic supply chain is complete in central and eastern regions of China such as Jiangsu, Shanghai and Zhejiang. We also find that the photovoltaic industry pays a great attention to manufacturing rather applications.

Key words: solar building, building-integrated photovoltaic (BIPV), supply chain, photovoltaic industry, patents