The World Has Already Crossed a ‘Tipping Point’ on Solar Power
Solar is set to overpower fossil fuels as the dominant electricity source globally by 2050, according to a new study. It’s also getting cheaper.
Workers install solar panels at a home in San Francisco on Sept. 27.
Photographer: Michaela Vatcheva/BloombergSolar power is set to dominate global electricity markets within the next few decades, and may have already reached an “irreversible tipping point,” according to a study published this week in Nature Communications. The study finds that solar adoption will continue apace barring any major policy shifts geared at disrupting it.
“If you don't put any additional policy in your system, you still get a switch or a flip,” says Femke Nijsse, a lecturer at the University of Exeter who focuses on energy-systems modeling and was lead author on the study. “We currently have a fossil fuel-dominated system and without additional policies, we arrive at a state that's dominated mostly by solar.”