Why the Future Looks Bright for Solar Energy

The Sun emits enough power each second to satisfy the entire human population’s demand for electricity for 2 hours. As the world continues to find a way to tap into this unlimited power source, silicon solar cells have begun to see growth. They will continue to decrease in cost and grow in demand. Over the past decade, the cost of solar energy has fallen drastically, and newly introduced technology is said to reduce the cost and increase efficiency even further. This year, we are looking at an installation of over 115 gigawatts of solar energy sources across the world which is way more than all other generation technologies put together. In some of the sunnier regions, it has already become the lowest costing form of electricity.

In the coming years, we are looking to see the price to install solar energy panels decrease even more so that by 2030, it’s projected that solar energy will become the largest source of energy for the production of electricity in a large portion of the world. There is a clear cost-reduction pathway laid out that will more than likely cut in half the already affordable prices it takes to acquire solar energy sources.

There are currently production plans that are to be implemented in the next ten years that will reduce the number of costly materials like silicon and silver that are used to manufacture solar panels. Even though processing silicon has become significantly cheaper over the past decade, it still contributes to a large portion of the cost it takes to manufacture these solar panels making this a huge step to universalizing the use of solar energy. Design-wise, companies are also looking to revitalize the current design and implement a bifacial model which allows the panels to capture light from both sides.

As these changes come to light, it will be the jobs of the innovators in the industry to engineer the ways that we can utilize this energy in our homes, businesses, and general power systems. This will result in better power technology, and overall increased use of low-cost digital technologies. The future is definitely bright with solar.

Sources:

https://www.weforum.org/agenda/2020/01/the-future-looks-bright-for-solar-energy/

https://sitn.hms.harvard.edu/flash/2019/future-solar-bright/

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