The solar industry has experienced rapid climb in recent years. In 2009, but 20GW of solar capacity was installed worldwide. In 2021, that number has skyrocketed above 480GW—a rate of 24x growth in only over a decade.

 

That growth has been made possible by rapid technological advancements. within the same timeframe, the value of a totally -installed system dropped from $7.14/watt in 2010 right down to around $2.50/watt in 2021. meaning you’ll go solar today for about one-third of what it might have cost ten years ago.

 

With the rapid climb in solar technology and therefore the decrease in pricing, is solar still worthwhile for the standard homeowner in 2021? That’s the question we’ll began to answer during this article. (Here’s a fast summary, though: if you own your home and hook up with the grid, the solution is presumably “yes.”)

Comparing the prices of Solar

If solar is getting cheaper, and therefore the technology is improving all the time, does that make it a far better investment than other options? To answer that, it’s not enough to match the value of solar against historical benchmarks. we’ve to seem at how solar stacks up against alternative methods of delivering power to your home, because solar panels are really only well worth the investment if it can outperform the opposite options on the market.

 

For grid-tied systems, the maths is pretty simple: you compare the value of solar against the value of shopping for power from the utility company to estimate the grid-tied payback period. (Don’t worry—we’ve written this text to steer you thru the maths .)

 

These calculations also can be applied to guage off-grid systems. rather than utility power, though, you’ll got to compare solar to the prices of running an influence line to your property (if possible) or check out alternative power sources, like wind, hydro, or a trusty generator. Sometimes a mixture of methods (like solar + a backup generator) could also be the neatest option.