We are constantly playing catch up with the terminology, let alone the science, of environmental efficiency in all its forms and considerations. Anthropocene delivers the daily goods, in the form of a summary of an environmentally-oriented scientific study, that we constantly find useful:
by Prachi Patel
Glinting solar panels have become the emblem of sustainability. Yet producing those silicon panels requires energy. So how green is solar power really? A new study shows that solar panels more than make up for the carbon that is released during their production.
Dutch researchers have found that by 2018, the solar panel industry will have created more energy than it has consumed in the past 40 years, saving more greenhouse gas emissions than were released during their production. The details are presented in the journal Nature Communications.
The team, led by researchers at Utrecht University in the Netherlands, analyzed results from 40 life-cycle studies of photovoltaic systems conducted between 1976 and 2014. They measured total installed solar power capacity by using country-level estimates that are based on surveys from photovoltaic suppliers. They also analyzed efficiency improvements of solar panels over those years…
…Solar installations grew dramatically at a rate of 45 percent per year from 1975 to 2015, they found. At the same time, the environmental impact of solar panel production has gone down. For every doubling of capacity of crystalline silicon panels, the energy use decreased by 12–13 percent and greenhouse gas footprint by 17–24 percent, depending on the type of silicon used…
Source: Atse Louwen et al. Re-assessment of net energy production and greenhouse gas emissions avoidance after 40 years of photovoltaics development. Nature Communications. 2016.
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