Solar Installations in the U.S. Hit 2 Million Mark

By Karen L. Edwards, RCS Editor.

Solar in the U.S. is on the rise with installations expected to double again by 2023.

A new report shows that there are now two million solar installations in the U.S. The two million number was reached only three years after the installations first reached 1 million, a number that took 40 years to reach.

The report and numbers were release by Wood Mackenzie Power & Renewables and the Solar Energy Industry Association (SEIA). The number of installations in the U.S. is expected to double to four million in just four years, reaching that number by 2023. “We believe that the 2020s will be the decade that solar becomes the dominant new form of energy generation,” SEIA CEO Abigail Ross-Hopper said in the statement.

According to Reuters, solar has grown in popularity due to falling prices on the technology, state mandates that require energy companies to source larger amounts of renewable energy and federal tax credits that can be worth up to 30 percent of the cost of the system.

Solar installations in the U.S. can now produce enough electricity to power more than 12 million homes according to the SEIA statement. California was responsible for 51 percent of the first million installations and 43 percent of the second million. Other states that helped to drive the growth include Texas, Rhode Island, Florida, Utah and Maryland, which combined have grown from around 50,000 installations to more than 200,000.

The statement reports that “Looking ahead, Illinois will see cumulative installations increase from 4,000 today to nearly 100,000 by 2024. While California will continue to lead the nation in installations, the remaining top 10 state markets will see faster growth. Nearly 750,000 installations are expected in those markets over the next 5 years, compared to 500,000 installations over the last 5 years.”

"According to our latest forecasts, by 2024 there will be, on average, one solar installation per minute," said Michelle Davis, senior solar analyst at Wood Mackenzie Power & Renewables, in a May 9 statement. "That's up from one installation every 10 minutes in 2010."

Photo credit: SEIA.

Get the latest industry news and updates when you sign up for the RCS Week-in-Review enews.