Dive Brief:
- The prevalence of behind-the-meter solar installations makes counting the total resource base a difficult task, and new research shows federal agencies may have significantly underestimated generation.
- According to analysis done jointly by Greentech Media, the Solar Energy Industries Association and kWh Analytics, solar production could be up to 50% higher than previously estimated by energy agencies.
- According to the groups, in the year preceding this March solar generation in the United States was approximately 30.4 million MWh – compared with federal estimates of 20.2 million MWh.
Dive Insight:
Last year there was more renewable power on the United States' grid than at any point since 1930 – back when wood and other biomass was a significant contributor. But the spread of distributed generation, and in particular rooftop solar, has made figuring the actual size of the resource difficult.
According to Greentech and SEIA, which jointly published their U.S. Solar Market Insight Q1 2015 report last month, customer-sited solar now sits at about 9.2 gigawatts-DC, or almost half of the country's installed capacity. Working with kWh Analytics, which has a large database of proprietary solar production data, the trio determined total solar output could be 50% more than estimated by the U.S. Energy Information Administration.
“The results are astonishing,” Greentech writes. The country's solar output would sufficiently power Hawaii, Rhode Island, Alaska and Vermont.
According to SEIA and GTM's Q1 market analysis, the residential solar market grew 76% in the first quarter of 2014, with 437 MW installed.
In a statement about the Q1 marketplace analysis, Shayle Kann, senior vice president at GTM Research said the results “provided a clear glimpse into the future role that the residential sector will play as a primary driver of not only solar market growth, but the overall electricity generation mix.”
“We expect more than three million residential solar installations over the next five years, marked by a broader trend toward customer engagement in energy usage, generation and management,” Kann said.