U.S. Solar installations jump 76% in 2012
Solar power’s spread across the country accelerated at a stunning clip last year, with installations surging 76 percent, according to an annual report released Thursday.
Enticed by plunging prices, American households, businesses and utility companies installed enough photovoltaic solar systems in 2012 to generate up to 3.3 gigawatts of electricity, according to the Solar Energy Industries Association (SEIA) and GTM Research. 
One third of those systems were in California, which became the first state ever to add more than a gigawatt of solar in a single year. That’s like plugging one new nuclear reactor into the state’s electricity grid (although unlike solar, a reactor puts out the same amount of electricity at night as it does during the day).
“There were 16 million solar panels installed in the U.S. last year — more than two panels per second of the work day — and every one of those panels was bolted down by a member of the U.S. workforce,” said Rhone Resch, president of SEIA.
Some perspective:
Go back five years, and the amount of solar power added nationwide totaled just 298 megawatts, or .298 gigawatts. In other words, America installed more than 10 times as much solar in 2012 as it did in 2008. And yes, it’s easy to get a whopping growth curve when you’re starting from a small base. But solar has finally reached the point where the numbers are adding up. The entire country now has enough solar panels in place to generate up to 7.2 gigawatts of electricity.
GTM predicts installations will grow another 30 percent in2013, adding another 4.3 gigawatts to the total.
Falling equipment prices are driving the growth. A worldwide glut of solar modules slashed prices by a stunning 41 percent between the fourth quarter of 2011 and the same period in 2012. By year’s end, the average sales price for a solar module hit 68 cents per watt, according to GTM.
The price of installing panels on your home didn’t fall quite as much. But it still dropped 18 percent, with the nation’s average residential installed price hitting $5.04 per watt. In California, it’s $5.36, according to state statistics.
Most of solar’s growth in 2012, however, came from large solar power plants selling their electricity to utilities. After years of planning and construction, the first round of big PV plants came online last year, aided by a federal tax credit and a California law forcing the state’s utilities to use more renewable power. Viewed together, the new plants added in 2012 can generate almost 1.8 gigawatts of electricity, and another 3.1 gigawatts are under construction.
– David R. Baker
