US solar production soars by 25 percent in just one year

2024 is seeing the inevitable outcome of the building boom in solar farms.

See full article...

 

[PoliteFun]

This is perfect for our deserts, let’s get some value out of all that sun!

 

[a5ehren]

Although I have solar myself, I still think (at least where I live) that taking large tracks of land and turning them into solar fields isn't a great idea. There is so much dead space on roofs and other areas that converting fields and forests into large scale solar doesn't make a lot of sense and otherwise reduces wildlife habitat further.

Rooftop solar is great, but the install/labor costs destroy the economics of it for almost all situations. The panel cost is only about 1/3rd of a home-scale project.

 

[Acidtech]

Although I have solar myself, I still think (at least where I live) that taking large tracks of land and turning them into solar fields isn't a great idea. There is so much dead space on roofs and other areas that converting fields and forests into large scale solar doesn't make a lot of sense and otherwise reduces wildlife habitat further.

Agro-Solar is a thing. Also, places like where I live, the "land" is literally just desert. Solar panels provide some respite for the wild life as well, instead of hiding under my car and chewing on my wiring harness.

 

[Iphtashu Fitz]

I'd be really curious to know how the growth of residential solar, and it's give-back to the grid, impacts all this. We finally were able to flip the switch on our solar panels earlier this month, and since we financed some of our Powerwall purchase with a 0% energy efficiency loan backed by National Grid we were obligated to enroll in their Virtual Power Plant program. When its operating the VPP shows roughly 1200 homes feeding upwards of 8MW back into the grid.

 

[YetAnotherBoris]

Although I have solar myself, I still think (at least where I live) that taking large tracks of land and turning them into solar fields isn't a great idea. There is so much dead space on roofs and other areas that converting fields and forests into large scale solar doesn't make a lot of sense and otherwise reduces wildlife habitat further.

I like the idea of colocating farms with solar PV generation: grazing livestock or growing shade-loving crops beneath elevated solar panels, or between vertically oriented panels.

 

[ERIFNOMI]

Although I have solar myself, I still think (at least where I live) that taking large tracks of land and turning them into solar fields isn't a great idea. There is so much dead space on roofs and other areas that converting fields and forests into large scale solar doesn't make a lot of sense and otherwise reduces wildlife habitat further.

Put them over farmland. Bifacial solar turns your food farm into a food and solar farm, allows you to grow more diverse crops, and reduces irrigation needs.

I want to put solar on my house so badly, but it just doesn't make sense for me unfortunately. I'm so close to just doing it anyway, but there are other things I'd rather spend my money on unfortunately.

 

[PadreDelAcantilado]

the agency has to estimate the amount produced, since the hardware often resides behind the metering equipment, so only shows up via lower-than-expected production

Shouldn't this say "lower-than-expected consumption"?

Back on topic, that last graphic has a whole lot of "Other" generating units coming online, especially in California. Anyone know what they all are?

 

[C.M. Allen]

Do these numbers include or exclude the backlog of industrial-scale solar projects going through permitting hell before they can be attached to the grid? I'm given to understand that there's hundreds of gigawatts of production in a years' long queue because the process moves so slowly. Which to be clear, I'm not saying that we should have these installations connect themselves to the grid willy-nilly style. That's a recipe for disaster, and we don't need to give the anti-renewables nutballs any more ammunition to feign legitimacy with. But like with the FAA launch-queue system, it's also pretty clear that the approval process (or its scale) isn't designed for the new renewables-focused development paradigm.

 

[Fatesrider]

...the rise of bitcoin mining, growth of data centers, and the electrification of appliances and transport.

3 out of 4 of those can be stopped or scaled back without any adverse impact on our way of life.

Natural gas appliances can go away, but let's stop putting connectivity in the appliances we have left, please. The individual decrease in electrical use may not be a lot but the ancillary use of electricity, and at scale, is likely huge.

Bitcoins need to die an agonizing death as they contribute nothing to human existence and are demonstrably bad for the environment.

And fuck the AI-creating data centers. May they burn in the pits of hell for eternity.

 

[numerobis]

Back on topic, that last graphic has a whole lot of "Other" generating units coming online, especially in California. Anyone know what they all are?

The article: The items in gray on the map primarily represent battery storage

 

[YetAnotherBoris]

Rooftop solar is great, but the install/labor costs destroy the economics of it for almost all situations. The panel cost is only about 1/3rd of a home-scale project.

It's more cost-effective to incorporate solar roofs on newly built homes from the get-go. California has been requiring this in its building code, since 2020.

 

[numerobis]

I'd be really curious to know how the growth of residential solar, and it's give-back to the grid, impacts all this. We finally were able to flip the switch on our solar panels earlier this month, and since we financed some of our Powerwall purchase with a 0% energy efficiency loan backed by National Grid we were obligated to enroll in their Virtual Power Plant program. When its operating the VPP shows roughly 1200 homes feeding upwards of 8MW back into the grid.

Article: Small-scale solar was "only" up by 18 percent,

 

[Iphtashu Fitz]

Although I have solar myself, I still think (at least where I live) that taking large tracks of land and turning them into solar fields isn't a great idea. There is so much dead space on roofs and other areas that converting fields and forests into large scale solar doesn't make a lot of sense and otherwise reduces wildlife habitat further.

Here in Massachusetts they've been adding solar farms to otherwise useless space, including capped garbage dumps / landfills, along the sides of highways, in the unused land of highway on/off ramps, etc. Adding solar to places like these shouldn't harm wildlife habitat, etc.

 

[numerobis]

Interesting in the map how the batteries are overwhelmingly being added west of the Mississippi. The Southeast I kind of get being slow onto the bandwagon, that's just their brand, but what's the excuse in the Northeast?

 

[ikjadoon]

Shouldn't this say "lower-than-expected consumption"?

Back on topic, that last graphic has a whole lot of "Other" generating units coming online, especially in California. Anyone know what they all are?

It might be battery storage? In other places, the EIA lists battery storage as "utility-scale generating units".

This is the older 2023 data:

Source: https://www.eia.gov/todayinenergy/detail.php?id=55419

 

[C.M. Allen]

3 out of 4 of those can be stopped or scaled back without any adverse impact on our way of life.

Natural gas appliances can go away, but let's stop putting connectivity in the appliances we have left, please. The individual decrease in electrical use may not be a lot but the ancillary use of electricity, and at scale, is likely huge.

Bitcoins need to die an agonizing death as they contribute nothing to human existence and are demonstrably bad for the environment.

And fuck the AI-creating data centers. May they burn in the pits of hell for eternity.

FYI: not all data centers are for AI. In fact most aren't. Humanity has a voracious appetite for all things digital data, and that data needs to be stored or processed somewhere. And not just in one place either. Netflix in England does not stream from the same data center as Netflix in Houston. Hell, for that matter, Netflix streams in Houston are probably coming from a different data center than Netflix streams in Seattle. And the scope of our digital appetites shows no sign of slowing down.

But Bitcoin? 100% on board with killing that crime-supporting blight on society. As far as I'm concerned, bitcoin/crypto cannot die fast enough.

 

[dfiler]

It's great to see coal is rapidly declining. That will really improve the air quality where i live.

Granted, the ones in my region are being replaced mostly by natural gas. So we'll still see green house gas emissions locally but there should be a large drop in particulate pollution.

 

[herculepoirot18]

Rooftop solar is great, but the install/labor costs destroy the economics of it for almost all situations. The panel cost is only about 1/3rd of a home-scale project.

It is a problem. I would like to do parking lot solar at my religious institution. Not only would it be environmentally friendly in an open location, protect congregants from rain/snow, but the energy generated would almost be like an endowment.

But the cost of building the supports makes it economically challenging. To do it in a viable way, we're going to need a multi six-figure charitable donation to support the cost, along with the federal tax credit.

 

[ERIFNOMI]

FYI: not all data centers are for AI. In fact most aren't. Humanity has a voracious appetite for all things digital data, and that data needs to be stored or processed somewhere. And not just in one place either. Netflix in England does not stream from the same data center as Netflix in Houston. Hell, for that matter, Netflix streams in Houston are probably coming from a different data center than Netflix streams in Seattle. And the scope of our digital appetites shows no sign of slowing down.

But Bitcoin? 100% on board with killing that crime-supporting blight on society. As far as I'm concerned, bitcoin/crypto cannot die fast enough.

It is rather funny that someone would bitch about the mere existence of data centers on an internet forum.

 

[1Zach1]

I’ll be interested in seeing the July update to FERCs infrastructure report. As of June (May data) Solar was 74% of new generation capacity brought online for 2024.

Also really hope we start seeing offshore wind start taking off.

https://cms.ferc.gov/media/energy-infrastructure-update-may-2024

 

[Dr. Jay]

Shouldn't this say "lower-than-expected consumption"?

Back on topic, that last graphic has a whole lot of "Other" generating units coming online, especially in California. Anyone know what they all are?

Yep, thanks for catching that.

 

[herculepoirot18]

Interesting in the map how the batteries are overwhelmingly being added west of the Mississippi. The Southeast I kind of get being slow onto the bandwagon, that's just their brand, but what's the excuse in the Northeast?

Perhaps batteries aren't as useful (at a grid level) until solar makes up a significant part of the power mix. For Q1 2024 in California, solar was 28.8% of the grid. Probably higher right now in July. For Q1 2024, solar was about 5% of the grid in New York.

 

[jezra]

Put them over farmland. Bifacial solar turns your food farm into a food and solar farm, allows you to grow more diverse crops, and reduces irrigation needs.

I want to put solar on my house so badly, but it just doesn't make sense for me unfortunately. I'm so close to just doing it anyway, but there are other things I'd rather spend my money on unfortunately.

Aside from farmlands, panels need to be installed over irrigation canals to generate electricity while reducing evaporation. Fortunately, CA has got the ball rolling https://www.gov.ca.gov/2024/04/04/m...over-canal-projects-are-coming-to-california/

 

[zombi3g]

Meanwhile Sunpower is going out of business.

 

[wxfisch]

For those on the fence about rooftop solar, what convinced us was not the idea that it would truly "pay-off" through fully offsetting 100% of our use/net meter excess, but rather that it largely fixes our power bill at whatever our finance payment is each month (roughly what our average power bill was). We pay $12 a month for the privilege of being connected to the grid, and in the depths of winter with a natural gas furnace pay a full power bill (mostly because we increased our normal usage after our install by swapping our gas water heater for a heat pump water heater combined with almost no production in super cloudy Pittsburgh over the winter). But since the power company is increasing rates substantially, the math still works out for us over the life of the system (keeping in mind that the warranty period is not the life of the system, that is an 80% generation capacity, but even at lower capacity we still make power). For us, adding another 2-4 panels would also likely solve our under production problem and is not that expensive to add on with micro inverters since the labor is pretty straight forward.

 

[WingMan]

Rooftop solar is great, but the install/labor costs destroy the economics of it for almost all situations. The panel cost is only about 1/3rd of a home-scale project.

The economics for me was a zero sum. I wasn't looking to make money off of it. For people not in a northern latitude the economics should be better than break even. I didn't even consider doing it until I knew that it'd pay for itself over the long term.

Over parking lots, over roads, some desert areas are pretty decent places. Removing farmland, not so much. Most of the arrays around where I am at are pretty densely packed and not much height to them. So maybe birds and small animals enjoy their shade but not much else. They are generally pretty well fenced in as well so it really isn't a boon to much else.

As far as bi-facials for being able to farm under them, well that will take specialized farm machinery for anything more than your own backyard. And again, around hear they aren't generally off the ground very high and they are as tightly packed as possible. Not much farming going to happen under them. Haven't seen anyone farming under them for the ones that have popped up in farm fields here.

 

[Martin Blank]

In 2000, about 52% of US electricity production was from coal. That it's now down to 14% is amazing.

The last large coal plant to come online was Sandy Creek in Texas, and that was in 2013. There are zero new coal plants planned for the US. The economics just don't work out for them anymore, even without renewable energy subsidies. Gas is substantially cheaper, but even that is getting pressure from ever-cheaper renewables.

 

[WingMan]

Here in Massachusetts they've been adding solar farms to otherwise useless space, including capped garbage dumps / landfills, along the sides of highways, in the unused land of highway on/off ramps, etc. Adding solar to places like these shouldn't harm wildlife habitat, etc.

Completely agree, those are great places to put it. Minnesota uses farmland for a lot of the alt energy.

 

[ERIFNOMI]

For those on the fence about rooftop solar, what convinced us was not the idea that it would truly "pay-off" through fully offsetting 100% of our use/net meter excess, but rather that it largely fixes our power bill at whatever our finance payment is each month (roughly what our average power bill was). We pay $12 a month for the privilege of being connected to the grid, and in the depths of winter with a natural gas furnace pay a full power bill (mostly because we increased our normal usage after our install by swapping our gas water heater for a heat pump water heater combined with almost no production in super cloudy Pittsburgh over the winter). But since the power company is increasing rates substantially, the math still works out for us over the life of the system (keeping in mind that the warranty period is not the life of the system, that is an 80% generation capacity, but even at lower capacity we still make power). For us, adding another 2-4 panels would also likely solve our under production problem and is not that expensive to add on with micro inverters since the labor is pretty straight forward.

Careful with this thinking. A lot of people are bad at understanding true costs and fall for bullshit hidden behind "oh it's only $X/period." Common trick for car dealers. They don't even want to talk about the actual cost of the car anymore, they ask "what do you want to pay per month" and they'll get you that number....at whatever term makes the lender the most money.

I had a solar quote go this way. They want to frame it as "it'll cost what your power bill costs for X years, while your power bill is going to be going up year after year" so you think you're saving money over time. But when I looked at the actual numbers, they were quoting me almost double the quote I got for the same exact hardware (same panels, same inverters, everything) from someone else.

 

[jlredford]

Something has come over me. What is this strange new feeling? I feel lighter. I hunch over less. Could it be - optimism? Nah, I'm sure it will pass.

 

[dlux]

It's more cost-effective to incorporate solar roofs on newly built homes from the get-go. California has been requiring this in its building code, since 2020.

Way back in the 2010s I suggested that, at the very least, new houses should be required to run an empty conduit from the house panel area up to the roof, just to eliminate that future expense after the house is occupied. Probably a couple hundred dollars labor/materials at most. You can't imagine some of the push-back I received on these very forums for proposing that.

 

[TylerH]

Although I have solar myself, I still think (at least where I live) that taking large tracks of land and turning them into solar fields isn't a great idea. There is so much dead space on roofs and other areas that converting fields and forests into large scale solar doesn't make a lot of sense and otherwise reduces wildlife habitat further.

Has anyone seriously suggested cutting down a forest to build a solar farm?!

 

[ERIFNOMI]

The economics for me was a zero sum. I wasn't looking to make money off of it. For people not in a northern latitude the economics should be better than break even. I didn't even consider doing it until I knew that it'd pay for itself over the long term.

Over parking lots, over roads, some desert areas are pretty decent places. Removing farmland, not so much. Most of the arrays around where I am at are pretty densely packed and not much height to them. So maybe birds and small animals enjoy their shade but not much else. They are generally pretty well fenced in as well so it really isn't a boon to much else.

As far as bi-facials for being able to farm under them, well that will take specialized farm machinery for anything more than your own backyard. And again, around hear they aren't generally off the ground very high and they are as tightly packed as possible. Not much farming going to happen under them. Haven't seen anyone farming under them for the ones that have popped up in farm fields here.

Because farming never involves special, bespoke machines...

Have you ever seen farm equipment? A combine harvester is pretty specialized for one job. Have you ever seen how tree fruits are harvested? A special tractor that grabs the tree and shakes the piss out of it.

 

[dlux]

Careful with this thinking. A lot of people are bad at understanding true costs and fall for bullshit hidden behind "oh it's only $X/period."

"I will gladly pay an installment plan Tuesday for one burger today."

 

[sporkinum]

I looked into solar 7 or 8 years ago. I had a company come out to give me a quote, and they did a solar survey on my roof. Turns out there are too many tall trees to the south and east. They said we would only get about 60% due to shade.
I may look into it again at some point, and just take the hit on efficiency as that would only apply April-October.

 

[daveishereagain]

Do these numbers include or exclude the backlog of industrial-scale solar projects going through permitting hell before they can be attached to the grid? I'm given to understand that there's hundreds of gigawatts of production in a years' long queue because the process moves so slowly. Which to be clear, I'm not saying that we should have these installations connect themselves to the grid willy-nilly style. That's a recipe for disaster, and we don't need to give the anti-renewables nutballs any more ammunition to feign legitimacy with. But like with the FAA launch-queue system, it's also pretty clear that the approval process (or its scale) isn't designed for the new renewables-focused development paradigm.

Increased approval backlog means added staff is needed to maintain a reasonable flow. Good luck having any government agency getting more staff.

 

[dlux]

Have you ever seen how tree fruits are harvested? A special tractor that grabs the tree and shakes the piss out of it.

Wouldn't it be more useful if it shakes the fruit out it?

(I'm not a fruit-grower so I don't know all the latest trade practices.)