Record-Breaking Solar Power Hits The Headlines Again

Solar power continues to soar ever higher, as a record amount of solar power was generated recently. British people basked in the summer heat all across the country, while around a quarter of our energy mix was powered by solar alone. It’s the latest in a series of record-breaking achievements for renewable energy – and all of them in just the last six months! So how has solar made headlines this time, and what does it mean for your business?

How Did Solar Break The Record?

On Friday 26^th of May, amongst clear blue skies and temperatures of around 28oC, the sun beamed its rays to solar panels across the country, which resulted in around 8.7 gigawatts (GW) of energy being generated just by lunchtime, making up about 24.3% of our total power mix. To reiterate, that’s almost a quarter of all energy being generated across the UK – a truly stunning achievement.

This breaks the previous record of 8.48GW of energy that was generated as recently as the 10^th of May. And before that, we’ve already told you about how Britain went a full day without any coal power at all last month in April. This really is turning out to be a remarkable year for record-breaking – and we’re not even halfway through it yet! It’s a fantastic demonstration of the raw power that solar energy has to offer, helped nicely by the fact that Britain has a combined 12.1GW of capacity in solar panels all across the country.

What The Experts Are Saying

As you can imagine, industry professionals (including us!) are already very excited about the development. Here’s what some of them had to say:

“This is the beginning of a new era. We now have significant volumes of renewable energy on the system, [and] the tools available to ensure we can balance supply and demand.”

• Duncan Burt, Head of Control Room Operations at the National Grid

“All around the world, solar power keeps beating new records as costs come down and power generation goes up.”

• Hannah Martin, Head of Energy at Greenpeace

“It’s free electricity today, for the consumer, and we should make the most of it. … Further records will certainly be broken this summer and for years to come.”

• Dr Alastair Buckley, Solar Expert at Sheffield University

“This is the first time that solar has generated more than nuclear. [It’s] a colossal achievement, and sends a very positive message that solar has a strong place in the decarbonisation of the energy sector.”

• Paul Barwell, CEO of Solar Trade Association

There’s No Better Time To Take Advantage Of Solar

As a nation we’re still steadily moving towards a greener future, as Britain continues to phase out solar power by shifting the focus to renewable sources like solar. As Dr Buckley has noted above, with our ever-increasing capacity and an incredibly bright summer ahead of us, solar power is more viable than ever before.

At Low Carbon Energy, we’ve got lots of customers who can attest to that fact. You can find out exactly how solar PV can benefit your organisation by visiting our solar panels sectors page.

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