SolarChat friend and participant Rhone Resch, the president and CEO of the Solar Energy Industry Association, was recently a guest speaker on NPR’s Diane Rehm Show speaking about America’s Energy Future Beyond Oil and Gas, and something he said really caught my attention. I may be paraphrasing a bit, but Rhone described that within the next five years, solar energy will be the “cheapest source of energy in all 50 states.” In fact, he declared that statement is currently fact in the case of a number of states already.
This is huge! Solar should be the energy source of choice in terms of American-made clean and reliable and affordable. “Cheapest in the country” has the potential to propel the industry — and the adoption of solar across mainstream America — to an entirely new level.
- From Q1 2012 to Q1 2013, residential system prices fell 15.8% percent, from $5.86/W to $4.93/W. Quarter-over-quarter, installed prices declined by 1.9% percent. Installed prices came down in most major residential markets, including California, Arizona, and New Jersey. It was not uncommon for final installed prices to be in the $4.00/W range.
- PV installations totaled 723 MW in Q1 2013, up 33% over Q1 2012
- Cumulative operating PV capacity in the U.S. now stands at 7,962 MW
- The residential market grew 53% over Q1 2012 and 11% over Q4 2012, continuing its streak of consistent incremental quarterly growth
- The non-residential market shrank 20% on both a quarterly and annual basis, which reflects slow demand across a number of major markets
- The utility market more than doubled year-over-year, with 24 utility PV projects completed in Q1 2013
- The average residential PV system price fell below $5.00/W, while the average non-residential systemprice fell below $4.00/W
| State | Rank (Q1 2013) | Rank (2012) |
| California | 1 | 1 |
| New Jersey | 2 | 3 |
| Hawaii | 3 | 7 |
| Arizona | 4 | 2 |
| North Carolina | 5 | 6 |
| Massachusetts | 6 | 5 |
| Tennessee | 7 | 15 |
| Colorado | 8 | 13 |
| Pennsylvania | 9 | 11 |
| Florida | 10 | 18 |
| Ohio | 11 | 17 |
| Missouri | 12 | 24 |
| New York | 13 | 10 |
| Vermont | 14 | 21 |
| Minnesota | 15 | 25 |
| George | 16 | 23 |
| Maryland | 17 | 8 |
| Texas | 18 | 12 |
| Oregon | 19 | 16 |
| Connecticut | 20 | 22 |
| Washington | 21 | 26 |
| New Mexico | 22 | 19 |
| Wisconsin | 23 | 28 |
| Nevada | 24 | 4 |
| Delaware | 25 | 20 |
| Illinois | 26 | 14 |
| Washington, D.C. | 27 | 27 |