How Many Solar Panels Are Used In The World

How do we arrive at this number.

How many solar panels are used in the world.

As of 2020 there are at least 37 countries around the world with a cumulative pv capacity of more than one gigawatt. 1 newly connected pv systems worth 7 6 gw were added this year. Italy uses 16 361 mw china uses 8 300 mw usa 7 777 mw japan 6 914 mw spain 5 166 mw france 4 003 mw belgium and australia uses 2 650 mw each czech republic uses 2 072 mw. Here we are supposing a panel size of 350w for the calculated size of 18tw of solar plants.

To put this into perspective this is about 10 000 times more than what humans need. A total of 51 42 billion solar panels would be needed to power the entire world on solar energy. It is estimated that global solar power capacity will triple by 2022 driven by chinese demand and the ever falling cost of buying and installing solar panels. Germany has by far the highest capacity of solar photovoltaic power pv in the world at 32 4 gw 31 at the end of 2012.

The potential for global solar energy has been estimated to be about 3 times that at 1600 exajoules 444 000 terawatt hours. The amount of solar power capacity expected to be added in the coming years is equivalent to 70 000 new solar panels every hour enough to cover 1 000 soccer pitches every day. In 2008 the world used about 474 exajoules or 132 000 terawatt hours worth of energy from all sources. Many countries around the world use this nature friendly source and germany is ahead of all the countries by using 32 411 mw of solar power.

We receive a staggering 1 74 10 17 watts of energy from it. 1 germany s solar panels generated about 23 twh terawatt hours of electricity in 2012 which is impressive but still only covers 3 of the country s total electricity consumption.