Solar installations accounted for bulk of new electric capacity in 2019, SEIA reports
Solar accounted for 40 percent of all new electric generating capacity in the country last year, the highest percentage it has ever had.
Plus, the 13.3 gigawatts (GW) of new capacity installed was more than any other source of electricity.
Despite tariffs and policy challenges, the U.S. solar market grew by 23 percent in 2019, according to the U.S. Solar Market Insight 2019 Year-in-Review report, released by the Solar Energy Industries Association (SEIA) and Wood Mackenzie.
“Even as tariffs have slowed our growth, we’ve always said that the solar industry is resilient, and this report demonstrates that,” SEIA President and CEO Abigail Ross Hopper said. “We know anecdotally that the COVID-19 pandemic is affecting delivery schedules and our ability to meet project completion deadlines based partly on new labor shortages. This once again is testing our industry’s resilience, but we believe, over the long run, we are well positioned to outcompete incumbent generators in the Solar+ Decade and to continue growing our market share.”
The residential solar sector saw a record 2.8 GW of new solar capacity installed last year, with California leading the way. Florida installed the second most rooftop solar in the country after California. Overall, the segment grew 15 percent last year.
“With much of the residential solar market to-date driven by California and Northeast states, Florida is a window into the future of the national residential solar market given its resemblance to the vast swath of markets with no state-wide incentive programs or the high electricity prices that make rooftop solar so attractive,” Austin Perea, senior analyst with Wood Mackenzie, said.
Also, the utility-scale market added 8.4 GW of new capacity in 2019, more than half of which came in the fourth quarter. Overall, a total of 30.4 GW of new utility PV projects were announced in 2019, bringing the contracted pipeline to a record high of 48.1 GW.
SEIA and Wood Mackenzie are monitoring changes to the industry related to the COVID-19 pandemic. The full impacts of the coronavirus outbreak on the solar industry are still developing, but SEIA has not yet incorporated any changes into its industry outlooks. Right now, the outlook for total installed PV capacity in the U.S. was projected to rise by 47 percent in 2020.
