How Many Solar Panels To Power The Usa

American solar power offsets over 70 million metric tons of carbon dioxide every year which is like planting almost 1 2 billion trees.

How many solar panels to power the usa. In this report nrel states that about 3 4 acres of solar panels are required to generate one gigawatt hour of electricity over the course of one year. There are over 1 47 million solar panels in use across the contiguous 48 states according to satellite machine learning from researchers at stanford. So you re saying it would only take 0 6 of the surface area of the continental united states to power the entire country with renewable solar power. This means an astounding consumption of 12 000 kwh per year per capita.

To put this into context 1 petawatt equals about 1 billion million watts. Just 11 200 000 acres to generate 4 000 000. Requires about 4 petawatts of electricityover one year to run life as normal. The seia report tallies all types of solar energy and in 2007 the united states installed 342 mw of solar photovoltaic pv electric power 139 thermal megawatts mw th of solar water heating 762 mw th of pool heating and 21 mw th of solar space heating and cooling.

Map courtesy of google maps. Consumes about 4 petawatt hours of electricity per year we d need about 13 600 000 acres or 21 250 square miles of solar panels to meet the total electricity requirements of the united states for a year. According to wood mackenzie the us is likely to install 3 million solar panels in 2021 and 4 million panels in 2023. Consumes around 4000 billion kwh of electricity.

I chose a 250 watt sharp nd 250qcs solar panel made in the usa 65 x39 each. The total number of solar installations in the us is on its way to get more than double in the next 5 years and it will consolidate the industry and provide economic strength. This is derived from the fact that every year the u. How much are 21 250 square miles.

Obviously wind energy wouldn t be the only form of primary energy in the usa. The yellow square is approximately 21 000 square miles. Solar hydro geothermal and biofuels will also play roles with solar being at least equal to wind generation.