Modeling technology based on a study shows that, from now to 2018, the solar panel industry will avoid greenhouse gas emissions by more than the industry over the past 40 years development of greenhouse gas emissions, energy consumption will also be more than its output. The study see production of clean energy solar panels net income. Relevant results on December 7, published in nature communications.
Solar panels industry to achieve a more clean energy production, but also in the process of production and laying of energy consumption and greenhouse gas emissions. With the development of the industry, it also improved the production efficiency of solar panels. Utrecht university in the Netherlands Wilfriedvan Sark and colleagues studied the global solar panel industry in the development of between 1976 and 2014, found that when the photovoltaic power generation capacity doubled, the energy consumption of production and deployment of solar panels will drop 12% ~ 13%, greenhouse gas emissions will drop 17% ~ 24%, depending on the materials used in panels). This means that the industry is likely to have paid off the "debt" in energy consumption and greenhouse gas emissions - even without, from the break even is very close.
Researchers on the solar panel industry whole life cycle assessment, and its model are compared with those of the United Nations and the international energy agency's database. They also analyzed the uncertainty factors in the model: the model of the worst cases, the industry will be to match the energy consumption in 2017, is expected to pay off greenhouse gas emissions in 2018 "debt".