New York City Rooftops Could Hold 11 GW Of Solar PV

Aug 26th Update: We received this note from Eduardo Berlin, CEO at Mapdwell: “We have updated the figures on our press release. They were incorrect as they were only considering partial boroughs — not all 5.” The initially reported 4.7 GW should have been 11 GW, and 5 million MWh should have been 13 million MWh, so we’ve updated the article accordingly. Eduardo’s subsequent quote was also updated.

Determining the potential energy your roof could generate with solar is an ever-increasing business, and following in the footsteps of Google’s new Project Sunroof, Mapdwell has revealed that New York City has the potential to install 11 GW worth of solar PV across over 1 million buildings.

To be completely fair, Mapdwell isn’t new to this game, and proclaims itself the “leader in urban solar mapping.” Founded in 2013, Mapdwell is a clean tech Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) spin-off “centered around providing information at the consumer level to drive sustainability through the aggregate effort of individuals.”

On August 21, Mapdwell launched Solar System New York City, the ninth such website that provides online rooftop solar PV tools giving users detailed and accurate information about their solar opportunities. The New York project covers over 1 million buildings and identified 11 GW worth of high-yield PV potential capacity, which would — if it was all built out — be able to deliver approximately 13 million MWh per year.

“This is over $40 billion in local business that could provide enough clean, renewable energy to over 1.2 million American homes while offsetting carbon emissions equivalent to planting 185 million trees,” explained Eduardo Berlin, CEO at Mapdwell. “Market conditions today include lowered hardware costs, tax credits, and incentive programs that make New York a hot solar market. Mapdwell wants to help New Yorkers work with the sun.”

According to Mapdwell, its software — which was developed by the company’s team at MIT — “is the first solar mapping tool that allows everyone to understand solar potential through an exciting experience and a detailed cost/benefit analysis that includes comprehensive financial, technical and environmental metrics.”

Image Credit: via Mapdwell, Facebook