Up to 10 terawatts of solar could be installed by 2030, according to solar researchers
Experts from the Global Alliance of Solar Energy Research Institutes (GA-SERI) recently published a new paper in Science that outlines a potential pathway to generate up to 10 terawatts of solar energy by 2030.
Generating this amount of solar energy would, however, require costs to continue to drop, continued technological advances in energy storage, and a move to more flexible grids, according to the paper.
“When we came together, there was a consensus that the global PV industry is on a clear trajectory to reach the multi-terawatt scale over the next decade,” lead author Nancy Haegel, director of NREL’s Materials Science Center, said. “However, reaching the full potential for PV technology in the global energy
economy will require continued advances in science and technology. Bringing the global research community together to solve challenges related to realizing this goal is a key step in that direction.”
Solar photovoltaics (PV) represented about one percent of total energy produced worldwide in 2015, while representing approximately 20 percent of new installation. There are currently approximately 71 gigawatts of installed solar capacity.
In addition to Haegel, David Feldman, Robert Margolis, William Tumas, Gregory Wilson, Michael Woodhouse, and Sarah Kurtz of the National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL) co-authored the paper, titled “Terawatt-Scale Photovoltaics: Trajectories and Challenges.”
The Fraunhofer Institute for Solar Energy of Germany, the National Institute of Advanced Industrial Science and Technology of Japan, and NREL are the member institutes of GA-SERI, which was founded in 2012. Fifty-seven experts from these organizations met in March 2016 in Germany to discuss policy initiatives and technology advances necessary for significant expansion of solar capacity over the coming decades.
