In an article on March 28, 2026, DW said, “In just one hour, the sunlight that hits the Earth delivers more energy than humankind would need for an entire year. By installing solar panels on less than 1 percent of the world’s surface, we could cover the world’s entire energy demand. And solar is getting ever cheaper.”
For those who don’t know (I was one of them until I looked it up), DW is a brand name for Deutsche Welle, the publicly-funded German news outlet that is roughly equivalent to NPR in the United States.
Covering one percent of the Earth’s surface with solar panels doesn’t seem like a hard task, except that two-thirds of the Earth is ocean, which takes a big chunk of available surface area off the table. Then, of course, there are those who are all in favor of solar panels, just as long as they don’t have to look at them.
Also, China manufactures about 80% of all the solar panels in the world, which makes other nations jealous, even though they had every opportunity to develop solar panel production systems of their own and failed to do so.
Putting those niggles aside, the thing that few seem to appreciate about solar panels is that once they are installed, the “fuel” that makes them produce electricity is free. By contrast, a thermal generating station requires fuel of some sort every second it is operation. That “fuel” is seldom produced locally. It has to be liberated from beneath the ground, shipped to processing facilities, then distributed via trains, trucks, or pipelines to where it is needed.
Every step in that process adds to the cost of those fuels and those costs are paid for by those who need the electricity. Part of those costs become profits for the companies that supply them — profits that over time have amounted to trillions of dollars — which is the primary reason why those companies fight so hard to keep their revenue stream intact.
DW says solar is growing exponentially around the world and if that growth continues, global capacity could hit 9,000 GW by 2030. That would be enough to meet more than 20 percent of the world’s energy demand.
CleanTechnica readers, who are all above average, hear so much about solar, they assume it is already providing most of the electricity in many parts for the world. That’s because of stories about California or Europe powering their utility grids with renewables for hours or even days at a time.
But those are aberrations. The situation is similar to electric cars. Even though in some countries — Norway is a prime example — EVs are topping the sales charts, it will still take a decade or more to replace all the gasoline- and diesel-powered vehicles on their roads. Thermal generation is going to be with us for a long time to come. The key is to reduce its share of the energy market as much as possible.
China installed 315 GW of solar panels in 2025, according to the Chinese energy authority, bringing total capacity in that country to around 1,300 GW. Data from LowCarbonPower in Taipei shows that 11% of China’s electricity now comes from solar energy. Over the last decade, coal power has dropped from 70 to 56% as more renewables come online. Is 56% from burning coal a good thing? No, in and of itself, it is not. But it is better than 70%. Patience, grasshopper.
The European Union, with 406 GW of solar capacity, ranks second in the world. It accounts for 13% of the EU’s electricity demand. Coal supplies only 9% — which is down considerably from 2015 when it supplied 25% of electricity to EU countries. Greece, Cyprus, Spain, and Hungary are leading solar nations, generating more than 20% of their electricity from solar. Germany with 119 GW of installed solar, is at 18%.
Even with renewable energy being undermined by the current US administration, the US still ranks third in the world when it comes to solar energy expansion with 267 GW, equivalent to about 8% of its total demand for electricity. Over the last 10 years, the percentage of coal power ion the US has dropped from 34% in 2015 to 17% in 2025.
The US Energy Information Agency this week issued a report predicting the US would add 41.5 GW of utility scale solar capacity by the end of January 2027. It also noted that planned battery capacity additions over the next 12 months will total 22.7 GW, an increase of 43.9%.
India is in fourth place with 136 GW of solar, about 8% of its electricity, while Japan is in fifth place with 103 GW of solar meeting 11% of its electricity demand. Brazil is also building out its solar capacity, which is now able to generate 10% of its electricity. Together with hydropower, wind, and biomass, 88% of that country’s power now comes from renewable sources. In 2015, Pakistan and South Africa each produced less than 1% of their electricity from photovoltaic panels. Ten years later, that has risen to 20% and 10% respectively.
DW reports that the cost of solar is decreasing, making it the cheapest form of electricity in many parts of the world. In regions blessed with abundant sunshine, it is now about 1 cent per kW, while in Germany it is between 4 and 5 cents.
According to the Fraunhofer Institute for Solar Energy Systems, the current price for nuclear power is between 14 and 49 cents per kilowatt-hour (16-56 US cents). Coal power costs between 15 and 29 cents per kilowatt-hour, while natural gas is between 15 and 33 cents. Based on those numbers, it is hard to justify the cost of any thermal generating additions.
All these statistics on global power trends tend to get blurry in our minds because it is so hard to wrap our heads around large scale data. This week, Solar Power World has a story about a church in San Diego that installed a 55 kW solar system and realized substantial savings as a result.
The installation was managed by Watthub, a commercial solar developer from Scottsdale, Arizona, that arranged a power purchase agreement for the Canyons Church. Today, most of its electrical needs are provided by the solar system. As local utility rates continue their upward climb, the savings from the PPA are going further than originally estimated.
John McDonnell, the founder of Watthub, said in an interview, “We did our initial proposals that said with the net of PPA payments, you’ll save $25,000 a year, but come to see all the rate hikes, and two years later, they’re saving almost $40,000.”
Nancy Loomis is the executive assistant for the church. She highlighted the real world impact of those savings. “We have about five acres that the church is on, which takes a lot of maintenance. We have the funds available now to do some of the upgrades that we needed to, but we’ve put a lot into the kids’ ministry as well and upgraded some of that area and hired another youth pastor just recently, so we can get our junior high programs and high school programs going. So, all of those savings help us to do other things.”
Loomis added, “For us, being able to do the PPA made a lot of sense rather than having to do an outright purchase. This was back in 2022, trying to come out of the COVID era. I had to convince the board, because it’s a 25-year commitment.” She says one of the biggest hurdles the church had to overcome was permitting.
“This is a success story,” McDonnell said. “The parties involved worked really well together. The nature of the PPA and the out performance and how much savings it’s producing. I’ve been in the business a long time and there are a lot of nightmare stories out there, and this was the opposite. We want to rebuild confidence in American businesses and real estate investors that solar does work. Loomis added, “It has allowed us to continue to grow where I don’t think we could have managed that three years ago.”
Every dollar we spend on utility bills is a dollar that cannot be spent on something else. Think of all the things we could do if our cost of electricity was less, both on the local and the national level. The current US administration wants to keeps us in servitude to utility companies forever, which is exactly the opposite of what the country needs.
The solution to high energy costs is right outside our windows. It’s called sunshine, and it’s free. Why not use it?
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Steve writes about the interface between technology and sustainability from his home in Florida or anywhere else The Force may lead him. He is proud to be “woke” and believes weak leaders push others down while strong leaders lift others up. You can follow him on Substack at https://stevehanley.substack.com/ but not on Fakebook or any social media platforms controlled by narcissistic yahoos.
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