Do Solar Panels Use More Energy Than They Generate?

Photo: Peter Blanchard/FlickrYou've probably heard the claim that solar panels take more energy to make than they generate. That's a pretty crushing thing to hear if you've just hired an electrician to install a fancy new solar system, in the belief that you're doing the right thing for the environment. But is it true? We decided to look into it, and hopefully resolve the debate once and for all.

So here's the claim: As you know, making solar panels requires energy. There's the direct use of energy to manufacture and transport the panels and their components. Furthermore, you have to think about the energy debt involved in acquiring raw materials and converting them into the parts used to make solar panels.

That can add up fast, and a lot of solar plants are using fuels like coal to generate the energy they need for activities like melting silicon. Researchers Sally Benson and Michael Dale looked into the industry's energy needs and overall energy production for Environmental Science & Technology and published a paper detailing their findings (the full text is available to ACS subscribers only). What they found will probably allow you to breathe a sigh of relief: solar panels generate more energy than they use, overall, and have been doing so since at least 2010.




As the industry grows and progresses, solar panel factories currently relying on outdated energy generation technologies like coal will ideally turn to alternative energy -- such as solar itself -- to power their operations. One reason coal remains persistent in the solar industry is that very high temperatures are required for the processing of some materials. That may be about to change thanks to the development of products that don't rely on silicon, which has a notoriously high melting point.



Katie Marks writes for

Updated December 13, 2017.

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