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Final week, I wrote concerning the enormous growth in US manufacturing construction investment that has come from Joe Biden’s sturdy reshoring and new manufacturing insurance policies (see graph above). Photo voltaic know-how manufacturing is part of that and the US Solar Market Insight Q4 2024 report launched right this moment by the US Photo voltaic Vitality Industries Affiliation (SEIA) reveals that effectively.
In line with the report, a new-record 9.3 gigawatts of photo voltaic module manufacturing capability have been added within the nation within the third quarter. And right here’s the massive aim Biden’s insurance policies on the matter have been concentrating on: “At full capacity, US solar module factories can produce enough to meet nearly all demand for solar in the United States.” Okay, we’re not fairly at 100% home provide, however take a look at how far we’ve come after offshoring nearly all of this beforehand!
The brand new report from SEIA and number-crunchers Wooden Mackenzie indicated that 5 photo voltaic module factories have been added or expanded in 4 totally different states: Alabama, Florida, Ohio, and Texas. (Paradoxically, these are all “red states,” or states that voted for the Republican nominee for president and mainly at all times do, but Republicans in Congress and Donald Trump are anticipated to kill key legal guidelines and insurance policies supporting this photo voltaic know-how manufacturing. A narrative for an additional day … sadly.)
Moreover, the important thing elements of photo voltaic modules — photo voltaic cells — are being produced within the US once more as of final quarter. “Solar cell manufacturing resumed in Q3 as silicon cells were manufactured in the United States for the first time since 2019, marking a pivotal moment for America’s surging solar manufacturing sector,” SEIA writes. It’s superb what occurs when you might have insurance policies supporting cleantech manufacturing like different main economies have, most notably China.
SEIA echoes the identical sentiment. “Federal solar policies and increased private investments are strengthening our nation’s energy security and creating thousands of new job opportunities for American workers,” says SEIA president and CEO Abigail Ross Hopper. “The United States is stepping up to take market share from foreign competitors and making sure that the jobs and economic growth from solar are benefiting American communities.” Certainly.
Now we will get to the conventional issues the Photo voltaic Market Perception report covers. Along with all of that manufacturing development, the US added 8.6 gigawatts (GW) of solar energy capability within the third quarter. That’s essentially the most ever added in a third quarter, and it’s a 21% enhance over Q3 2023. The industrial photo voltaic market had 44% extra capability put in within the third quarter than in Q3 2023, and the neighborhood photo voltaic market had 12% extra capability put in within the third quarter than in Q3 2023, nevertheless it was the utility-scale photo voltaic market that drove a lot of the development, including 6.6 GW of latest solar energy capability.
So far as residential solar energy goes, SEIA shares that previously two years, 1.4 million American houses added photo voltaic panels to their roofs with assist from US photo voltaic incentives. Within the third quarter alone, almost 30,000 Floridians put in rooftop solar energy techniques.
General, Florida, The Sunshine State, put in extra solar energy capability than all however one different state. The state that put in extra was Texas. The largest “red state” within the nation put in 2.6 GW of solar energy capability final quarter, 30% of latest capability, and it put in almost 25% of latest solar energy capability within the first three quarters of 2024. It may find yourself with 10 GW of latest solar energy capability itself this 12 months.
Wanting ahead, predictions are by no means excellent or straightforward, as issues can change rather a lot in a big market like this influenced by massive nationwide and state insurance policies. To finish, listed here are a couple of predictions from SEIA:
- New photo voltaic era capability will exceed 40 GW in 2024.
- New photo voltaic era capability will attain at the least 43 GW a 12 months for the remainder of the 2020s.
- Practically 450 GW of solar energy capability shall be in place by the top of 2029 in america.
- Solar energy will present sufficient electrical energy for greater than 71 million houses a 12 months by 2029.
We’ll dive into extra of the US Solar Market Insight Q4 2024 report in coming days, however these highlights look like a great begin.
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