Originally published on Solar Love.
When we see a statistic like this — 63% solar growth rate — we might tend to assume the growth was for one year. However, solar power grew 63% per year in New York state for the years 2010–2013.
This figure comes from a new report titled, Star Power: The Growing Role of Solar Energy in New York.
It also says that the entire state of New York could be powered by solar. Actually, it says New York has enough solar power potential to generate eleven times the electricity it consumes.
Back to the current reality though, which is more tangible. If solar power in New York grew at an annual rate of 63% for several years, then the total growth was well over 100%.
Of course, such growth is a big success, but did you hear about it on local or national broadcast news? Probably not, just like you probably didn’t get to learn about the 15,000 jobs created by solar power in California.
That’s right, there is a lot of good clean energy news which is not being reported by mainstream media outlets. If the Internet wasn’t available, we very likely wouldn’t hear about such developments at all.
If New York’s solar power continues to grow at a similar rate, the whole state could generate about 20% of its electricity from solar by 2025. If the state could achieve such a high level of solar power production, it would mean there would be far less electricity consumed from coal power plants. Not burning the enormous amounts of coal required to produce 20% of the state’s energy would mean there would be far less CO2 produced because solar power creates none of it. In fact, using solar power instead of coal power would be like taking about three million cars off the roads, in terms of reducing CO2 emissions.
The solar benefits don’t stop there. Last year, about 5,000 people in New York were employed by the local solar industry. If solar power grows to 20% of all electricity there by 2025, a considerable number of new jobs will be added in the process.
New jobs mean money in the pockets of more residents, which will most likely be spent locally.
Reprinted with permission.
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