Photovoltaics is outperforming traditional power plants

Published on: August 22, 2020 / update from: August 22, 2020 - Author: Konrad Wolfenstein

Photovoltaics outperforms traditional power plants – @shutterstock | Martin Lisner

The importance of photovoltaics for local electricity generation is increasing unabated. An analysis by the Fraunhofer Institute just showed that solar and wind energy shared the top spot in net electricity generation in Germany for the first time in June. Accordingly, photovoltaic systems contributed 7.04 terawatt hours (TW) to electricity generation in this country.

This put them just behind wind turbines, which came in at 7.09. In comparison, gas power plants (6.5 TW) and brown coal power plants (6.4 TW) performed significantly worse. The share of 18.3 percent for photovoltaics clearly shows why many people rightly see it as the preferred technology for the energy transition.

Renewable energies in the lead for the first time in June 2020

In combination with energy from wind and biomass, photovoltaics achieved something historic in June: for the first time, the share of renewable energies in net electricity generation exceeded that of power plants with non-renewable energies. While natural sources contributed 19.3 TW, or 50.4 percent, to the German electricity mix in June, conventional energy sources only contributed 18.8 TW. For comparison: In June 2010 the ratio was 32.7 TW to 9.3 TW in favor of traditional power plants.

Given these impressive numbers, it is hard to believe how low solar energy is in this country. Just ten years ago, their share was a meager 1.8 percent of total production in Germany and in 2003 it was only a pitiful 0.1 percent.

And the popularity of photovoltaics is likely to continue to increase in the future. The reason for this is the major technical developmental leaps in technology. New modules and processes now allow large solar systems to produce electricity for 5 cents per kilowatt hour. This means that the technology is now worthwhile even without government subsidies, which will give photovoltaics a strong boost among professional users and investors.

Suitable for:

• Germany is the world leader in wind and solar
• Record share of renewable energies of 55.8 percent
• Photovoltaics are on the rise across Europe
• The sun gold of 68 terawatt hours in North Rhine-Westphalia
• The breakthrough: solar parks profitable without subsidies