Commentary: Photovoltaics firmly moving to the terawatt scale

Abstract

During the last two decades, the deployment of solar cells for the direct generation of electricity has been quite notable, and photovoltaic (PV) systems can at present be considered as a mature technology that is often incorporated in utilities portfolios. Of all sources of renewable energy, PV solar cells probably constitute the best example illustrating the technology-learning mechanism. The last decade has seen a real fall of prices of PV solar cells after the silicon shortages of the 2003 to 2006 period. Figure 1 shows in a log-log space the cost (in constant 2012 dollars) evolution of PV modules in relation to the cumulative1 installed capacity, which at present is about 100 GW in the whole world.1,2