Is Global Warming becoming unstoppable?

[Knobby22]

What? Your quote:

"When the question was asked it was still a question, it is unstoppable now. So I suppose we need a new thread name."

You just came here to abuse people. Stop it.

 

[sptrawler]

Maybe re read #4,322 and #4,324 and my response at #4,325.
Questioning why the posters feel they are in a position to question/criticise others, isn't abuse, it is just seeking clarification.

 

[wayneL]

Maybe re read #4,322 and #4,324 and my response at #4,325.
Questioning why the posters feel they are in a position to question/criticise others, isn't abuse, it is just seeking clarification.

Disagreeing with the extreme left is blasphemy, SP.

 

[sptrawler]

Disagreeing with the extreme left is blasphemy, SP.

I don't disagree with them, just find it amusing that they always present themselves as parogons of virtue, while throwing fire and brimstone at all and sundry.
Bit like the church really, when you peel back the veneer, there isn't a lot of credibility IMO .

 

[Smurf1976]

Disagreeing with the extreme left is blasphemy, SP.

The politics of all this says an awful lot.

Suppose there was a political party that opposed major transmission projects, opposed large scale hydro, saw Australia's future as being with resource extraction and low value services and which wanted to put gas in everyone's home.

They'd be real climate wreckers, right?

Just one thing.

The Coaliton and the Greens have both done exactly that. It's Coalition policy right now, it was Greens policy for most of the party's history since its inception. Apart from the transmission lines Labor's done all of it too. Only real exception's nuclear.

It's quite amusing when people get fired up about one political party versus another. On occasion at the state level there are real differences between parties in the same state but federally they're all remarkably similar despite what they claim. Greens or Liberal? Coles or Woolworths? Not a lot of difference really.

May as well just call it the National Green Liberal Labor Party and be done with it. They're all misnamed anyway - National isn't national, Greens gave up on the environment years ago, Liberals aren't at all liberal, and Labor hasn't been a workers' party for close to half a century now. All are classic examples of trading on past reputation and image over substance.

Between the states is where the differences lie, but that doesn't really depend on which party's in government, it's more a state thing as such.

 

[sptrawler]

The politics of all this says an awful lot.

Suppose there was a political party that opposed major transmission projects, opposed large scale hydro, saw Australia's future as being with resource extraction and low value services and which wanted to put gas in everyone's home.

They'd be real climate wreckers, right?

Just one thing.

The Coaliton and the Greens have both done exactly that. It's Coalition policy right now, it was Greens policy for most of the party's history since its inception. Apart from the transmission lines Labor's done all of it too. Only real exception's nuclear.

It's quite amusing when people get fired up about one political party versus another. On occasion at the state level there are real differences between parties in the same state but federally they're all remarkably similar despite what they claim. Greens or Liberal? Coles or Woolworths? Not a lot of difference really.

May as well just call it the National Green Liberal Labor Party and be done with it. They're all misnamed anyway - National isn't national, Greens gave up on the environment years ago, Liberals aren't at all liberal, and Labor hasn't been a workers' party for close to half a century now. All are classic examples of trading on past reputation and image over substance.

Between the states is where the differences lie, but that doesn't really depend on which party's in government, it's more a state thing as such.

Exactly, I'm not saying one side is right or wrong, just that there appears to be a lot of unfounded moral tamborine playing going on, in today's paper an article that shows there is a misconception going on.

The $50 billion gas deal Australia hopes will keep China quiet

Australia is offering a multi-billion-dollar lifeline to fast-track an offshore gas project the government hopes will keep Beijing at bay.

www.smh.com.au

 

[IFocus]

Even if it is unstoppable, every effort should be made to reduce our emissions, if we have the technical ability to do so.
If we didn't adopt that ideology we would still have every second house burning wood and coal in lounge room fires, thank god that was stopped.
However we always end up in the same old political roundabout, rather than discussing the issue at hand and we wonder why nothing gets done in Canberra.
Is global warming becoming unstoppable? who knows, but you never know everyone might end up living in a cave if a sensible way of addressing it isn't sorted.

What are you on about seriously, we do have the technical ability to reduce greenhouse gasses.

To achieve that requires government policy along with energy and business interests.

Where have you been?

What I have said about the coming armageddon is ATM reality, 52 degrees C in Delhi is bigger than dropping a nuclear bomb on the city.

2024 we have 52 degrees c 20 years ago that was unimaginable, 2050 what do you think the temperature could be then please note the current rise is not linear.

You recon me living in a cave will help change that?

 

[Smurf1976]

This thread is purely commenting on the science.

That's the original intent but in practice when most posts are of the "what can we do?" variety, they're going to prompt responses.

The two are intertwined. A scientific discussion on whether it's becoming unstoppable is itself dependent on what, if anything, is done to stop it.

"Is the out of control bus becoming unstoppable?" - well that depends. Are we going to shift to a lower gear? Are we going to use the brakes? Are we going to use that runaway vehicle ramp that's up ahead? Could we "lightly" crash the bus against railings, small trees etc to absorb energy and bring it to a stop without causing a full blown crash? Etc.

The answer to the question does depend on the responses.

 

[IFocus]

I don't disagree with them, just find it amusing that they always present themselves as parogons of virtue, while throwing fire and brimstone at all and sundry.
Bit like the church really, when you peel back the veneer, there isn't a lot of credibility IMO .

Who?

Those that continually quote the foreign owned News Corp?

 

[sptrawler]

Who?

Those that continually quote the foreign owned News Corp?

Those that keep trying to make it about the history and politics, rather than about the science, options, successes and failures.
All the discussions end up become a political stage and a psuedo election platform rather than about the issue and enriching the debate, it just ends up being about personality politics and left wing media vs right wing media, which in turn results in most threads morphing into the same theme.

News Corp bad vs ABC and ex Fairfax media being bad. Morrisson, Dutton bad, vs Albo, Bowen bad. those that dissagree vs those that agree,
rather than what is and isn't being done to mitigate global warming.

The Greens and activists are against LNG, which is understandable as it also will further contribute to global warming, but they are also against nuclear and dams which again is their perogative, but it does limit the options to effectively reduce emmissions quickly.

Then we have people who IMO rightly agree with using gas, as it is a net reduction in emissions, but in reality is still compounding the problem then in the same breath they say others aren't taking the issue seriously.

As for, do I reckon you living in a cave will change anything, actually no because most people have that very same attitude and is why most ingrained issues never change.
The very trait you actually were criticising others for, "why should I change, it wont make a difference", sounds very familiar.

So is global warming becoming unstoppable?
Probably, due to the fact no one really wants to curb their lifestyle and emmissions will increase to facilitate that lifestyle, be it with more food consumption, more material consumption as affluence increases in third world countries, more consumerism in first world countries and increasing population. Is it news corp or X or the ABC's fault, no it's people being people and always wanting more.

As someone said:
Presently the climate is changing at a pace unrecognizable in recorded history exactly as science has predicted, the 52 degrees recorded in Delhi is a terrible event yet not a mutter from many and still we are a long way from 2050 what then?

 

[basilio]

Those that keep trying to make it about the history and politics, rather than about the science, options, successes and failures.
All the discussions end up become a political stage and a psuedo election platform rather than about the issue and enriching the debate, it just ends up being about personality politics and left wing media vs right wing media, which in turn results in most threads morphing into the same theme.

News Corp bad vs ABC and ex Fairfax media being bad. Morrisson, Dutton bad, vs Albo, Bowen bad. those that dissagree vs those that agree,
rather than what is and isn't being done to mitigate global warming.

The Greens and activists are against LNG, which is understandable as it also will further contribute to global warming, but they are also against nuclear and dams which again is their perogative, but it does limit the options to effectively reduce emmissions quickly.

Then we have people who IMO rightly agree with using gas, as it is a net reduction in emissions, but in reality is still compounding the problem then in the same breath they say others aren't taking the issue seriously.

As for, do I reckon you living in a cave will change anything, actually no because most people have that very same attitude and is why most ingrained issues never change.
The very trait you actually were criticising others for, "why should I change, it wont make a difference", sounds very familiar.

So is global warming becoming unstoppable?
Probably, due to the fact no one really wants to curb their lifestyle and emmissions will increase to facilitate that lifestyle, be it with more food consumption, more material consumption as affluence increases in third world countries, more consumerism in first world countries and increasing population. Is it news corp or X or the ABC's fault, no it's people being people and always wanting more.

As someone said:
Presently the climate is changing at a pace unrecognizable in recorded history exactly as science has predicted, the 52 degrees recorded in Delhi is a terrible event yet not a mutter from many and still we are a long way from 2050 what then?

A interesting perspective SP. Worth unpacking.

First most critical point. Is global warming a real and very serious problem ? Are the principal causes massive human generated Greenhouse Gases ? If we agree with these premises then the logical next step is we have to deal with it and it's in our power to do so .

The History and Politics you disparage is at the core of why we are currently going off the cliff. As I noted in post 4330 it has been the efforts of powerful commercial and media forces over 40 years that has undermined government commitment to dealing with CC. That is still very much the case.

CO2 emissions and lifestyle. The mantra of the fossil fuel companies has been that you can only have improvements in standard of living with lock step increases in energy consumption. Given that these have historically been fossil fuel sourced that meant more emissions.

A carbon free renewable based energy system destroys this mantra. Replace the overwhelming majority of power generation, transportation and heating/cooling with clean energy and immediately your emissions fall even as your energy use may stay the same. Of course if you make trillions of dollars in producing fossil fuels you don't want to see this outcome.

Consumerism. The treadmill of more and more products, planned obsolescence, shoddy construction leading to early failures is a CC and environmental scourge. Imagine as a citizen how rich your life would be with a well built modest house, a 40 year refrigerator and similar long life hot water system and other essential/useful goods. Unfortunately of course our current economic system cannot handle this concept. The idea that people aren't forced or persuaded to continually replace goods or deal with poor quality construction undermines the perpetual growth model of our economic system.

The issue of dealing with CC is inextricably mixed with having a sustainable lifestyle. Even if, miraculously, we went totally renewable in 10 years and them, also miraculously, we sucked 80 billion excess tons of CO2 from the atmosphere we would still have to deal with a system that demands ever increasing consumption for its own sake. That won't fly.

--------------------------------------------------
Speaking of flying. One of exceptionally difficult issues around reducing GG emissions is the impact of mass air travel on global warming. So even those people who take exceptional care with their carbon footprint at home effectively blow it to pieces when they hop on a plane to "See Rome Before They Die" (or anywhere else) .

Maybe we just can't do everything we have been told is our Capitalist birthright ?

Impacts of aviation​

Aviation affects the climate in a variety of ways.

Because any carbon dioxide you emit stays in the atmosphere for hundreds of years, it doesn’t matter much whether you release it from the exhaust pipe of your car at sea level or from a jet engine several kilometres high. Per passenger, a flight from Auckland to Wellington will put a similar amount of carbon dioxide into the air as driving solo in your car. Catching the train will cut your carbon emissions seven-fold.

When aircraft burn jet fuel, however, they also emit short-lived gases like nitrogen oxides, which can react with other gases in the air within a day of being released. When nitrogen oxides are released at altitude they can react with oxygen to put more ozone into the air, but can also remove methane.

Ozone and methane are both greenhouse gases, so this chain of chemical reactions can lead to both heating and cooling effects. Unfortunately the net result when these processes are added together is to drive more warming.

Depending on the atmospheric conditions, aircraft can also create contrails: clouds of tiny ice crystals. The science is not as clear cut on how contrails influence the climate, but some studies suggest they could have an effect as significant as the carbon dioxide released during a flight.

There is also considerable uncertainty as to whether aircraft exhaust might affect cloud formation itself - this could be a further significant contribution to warming.

Climate explained: how much does flying contribute to climate change?

Globally, emissions from air travel account for only about 3% of the warming human activities are causing, but aviation affects our climate in a number of ways.

theconversation.com

 

[sptrawler]

Agree 100% @basilio with this.

Consumerism. The treadmill of more and more products, planned obsolescence, shoddy construction leading to early failures is a CC and environmental scourge. Imagine as a citizen how rich your life would be with a well built modest house, a 40 year refrigerator and similar long life hot water system and other essential/useful goods. Unfortunately of course our current economic system cannot handle this concept. The idea that people aren't forced or persuaded to continually replace goods or deal with poor quality construction undermines the perpetual growth model of our economic system.

The issue of dealing with CC is inextricably mixed with having a sustainable lifestyle. Even if, miraculously, we went totally renewable in 10 years and them, also miraculously, we sucked 80 billion excess tons of CO2 from the atmosphere we would still have to deal with a system that demands ever increasing consumption for its own sake. That won't fly.


With regard this statement:

The History and Politics you disparage is at the core of why we are currently going off the cliff. As I noted in post 4330 it has been the efforts of powerful commercial and media forces over 40 years that has undermined government commitment to dealing with CC. That is still very much the case.

40 years ago what other source of reliable energy was available other than fossil fuel, nuclear or hydro? Also it was the green activists that curtailed hydro and nuclear, so your comment does seem to lack depth. Maybe you could expand on it.

 

[basilio]

Agree 100% @basilio with this.

Consumerism. The treadmill of more and more products, planned obsolescence, shoddy construction leading to early failures is a CC and environmental scourge. Imagine as a citizen how rich your life would be with a well built modest house, a 40 year refrigerator and similar long life hot water system and other essential/useful goods. Unfortunately of course our current economic system cannot handle this concept. The idea that people aren't forced or persuaded to continually replace goods or deal with poor quality construction undermines the perpetual growth model of our economic system.

The issue of dealing with CC is inextricably mixed with having a sustainable lifestyle. Even if, miraculously, we went totally renewable in 10 years and them, also miraculously, we sucked 80 billion excess tons of CO2 from the atmosphere we would still have to deal with a system that demands ever increasing consumption for its own sake. That won't fly.


With regard this statement:

The History and Politics you disparage is at the core of why we are currently going off the cliff. As I noted in post 4330 it has been the efforts of powerful commercial and media forces over 40 years that has undermined government commitment to dealing with CC. That is still very much the case.

40 years ago what other source of reliable energy was available other than fossil fuel, nuclear or hydro? Also it was the green activists that curtailed hydro and nuclear, so your comment does seem to lack depth. Maybe you could expand on it.

35-40 years ago we had solar power. President Carter had solar panels on the White House. We also had wind power. They were effective but at that stage not as cost competitive as the raw cost of fossil fuels.

There was a very strong scientific agreement that the increase in CO2 levels was having a clear impact on temperatures and that this would escalate as GG emissions increased. Scientists believed the major effects global warming would happen around 2030 if left unchecked. This agreement crystalized from 1988 -1992

Everyone understood that making a transition to a no carbon renewable energy economy was a mammoth task. It was effectively a re engineering of our entire society. The time scale of an orderly transition would be a minimum of 30 years probably more like 50.

In terms of economics one of the levers of this change was to put a price on carbon that reflected the impact it was happening on the environment. This price would enable non carbon based investment to compete economically. There was also the opportunity to encourage large scale research and development into these technologies to improve the efficiencies and bring down costs. (That has now happened and would have probably occurred much earlier if the focus and research had been undertaken then)

These were all stalled by the fossil fuel industry which opened their campaigns of deny, doubt, ridicule and a host of red herrings

Nuclear power
Nuclear powers' cachet as a safe, cost effective alternative had been badly hurt in the 80's. The Three Mile island breakdown was a near catastrophe. Chernobyl in 1986 was a real catastrophe . The costs of nuclear power stations was always increasing. The early promise of cheap, unlimited clean power was a mirage. There was also concern about decommissioning costs as power stations reached the end of their operational life. To date these haven't been resolved.

The promise of Nuclear Fusion technology has been on the horizon for 30 plus years. It still hasn't borne fruit. One wouldn't write it off yet but the need to have results in the near term rather than many uncertain years in the future has made it impossible to rely on the technology.

Climate Change History

Climate change is the long‑term alteration in Earth’s climate and weather patterns caused by human activity. It took nearly a century of research and data to convince the vast majority of the scientific community that human activity could alter the climate of our entire planet.

www.history.com

https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1177/0192512120975659

The chase for fusion energy

An emerging industry of nuclear-fusion firms promises to have commercial reactors ready in the next decade.

www.nature.com

 

[Smurf1976]

A interesting perspective SP. Worth unpacking.

First most critical point. Is global warming a real and very serious problem ? Are the principal causes massive human generated Greenhouse Gases ? If we agree with these premises then the logical next step is we have to deal with it and it's in our power to do so .

The History and Politics you disparage is at the core of why we are currently going off the cliff. As I noted in post 4330 it has been the efforts of powerful commercial and media forces over 40 years that has undermined government commitment to dealing with CC. That is still very much the case.

The trouble with politics is that all the parties are much the same.

Mass scale aviation has always been central to Green politics for example. That goes back as far as the late 1960's when the movement was just beginning to emerge - it has always seen mass tourism as something to be actively encouraged. That's applied everywhere from the EU to the Tasmanian wilderness, mass tourism has always been a core pillar of the whole ideology.

That's not intending to single out the Greens. It's just pointing out that they're part of the problem not the solution and same goes for Labor, Liberal, Nationals, One Nation etc. Many seem to think they're the answer but their track record is a complete failure on the issue. They're good with conservation and social issues but not with climate.

There is no political party that's offering a solution. All that differs is how honest they are about it and how willing their own supporters are to admit the truth.

I'll accept as valid an argument that it'd be helpful if government wanted to fix the problem. It's very unlikely to happen though, that's abundantly clear, so there's no point sitting around expecting that to change. An alternative approach is required.

In saying that I do think the corner has been turned and real progress will be seen in the 2030's. Let's just say the politics there will be a sight to behold.....

 

[sptrawler]

Again a better representation @basilio but in reality thin film solar panels haven't had the efficiency or cost competitiveness until around 2000, even then from memory BP and NSW uni achieved 10.8% a new record for thin film solar pv, now we are up to 34% efficiency.

In about 1980 the cost of solar panels were about $300/watt again from memory, now in the last 10 years with manufacturing based in China costs have dropped hugely and Australia has one of the highest solar pv grid penetrations in the World and that hasn't happened in the last two years.

So realistically the only way we could have moved away from fossil fuel even 20 years ago would have been with nuclear, which was stopped and I still think isn't suitable for the East coast grid, it may well end up being considered for W.A if all else fails time will tell.
So to suggest renewables could have been done 30 to 40 years ago, is fanciful IMO, we are struggling with pv solar and storage now with current technology, it would have been impossible 30 or 40 years ago.

Climate change whether it is causing global warming or not, shouldn't be the driver of renewable and sustainable emission free energy IMO, humans should want to do it because they can not because they have to.
It is a pretty selfish attitude to just keep raping the world of its resources and wasting them, just because we can, its a sad legacy to leave behind IMO.
We removed lead from fuel, stopped open fires in suburbia due to health concerns and the advent of cleaner heating sources, going to renewables is just another step along the path, the echnology is there it should be adopted if it's suitable and capable of doing the job.
Just another step along the path of human existence. Lol

 

[Smurf1976]

Everyone understood that making a transition to a no carbon renewable energy economy was a mammoth task. It was effectively a re engineering of our entire society. The time scale of an orderly transition would be a minimum of 30 years probably more like 50.

Emphasis mine and I fully agree.

These were all stalled by the fossil fuel industry which opened their campaigns of deny, doubt, ridicule and a host of red herrings

Trouble is, most of society actively jumped on board with them which made it pretty much impossible for any alternative view to gain traction.

It's one thing to argue against Labor, Liberal or the Greens. It's quite something else to argue against all of them at once. The average scientist or engineer has no chance, even CEO's and others with an existing public profile invariably fall flat.

 

[basilio]

Again a better representation @basilio but in reality thin film solar panels haven't had the efficiency or cost competitiveness until around 2000, even then from memory BP and NSW uni achieved 10.8% a new record for thin film solar pv, now we are up to 34% efficiency.

In about 1980 the cost of solar panels were about $300/watt again from memory, now in the last 10 years with manufacturing based in China costs have dropped hugely and Australia has one of the highest solar pv grid penetrations in the World and that hasn't happened in the last two years.

The cost of solar panels from 1990 onwards would be fairer comparision. The early 90's would have been the beginning of large scale solar installations.

At that stage they would have been more expensive than fossil fuel powered projects. However if there had been focus on moving decisively to a renewable energy future R and D would have been intensified.

In a more staged transition one wouldn't have to bet the house on the first technologies that came out of the block. However a decent carbon tax would have sent market signals that encouraged these technologies and discouraged fossil fuels. That never happened.

Evolution of solar PV module cost by data source, 1970-2020 – Charts – Data & Statistics - IEA

Evolution of solar PV module cost by data source, 1970-2020 - Chart and data by the International Energy Agency.

www.iea.org

 

[sptrawler]

The cost of solar panels from 1990 onwards would be fairer comparision. The early 90's would have been the beginning of large scale solar installations.

At that stage they would have been more expensive than fossil fuel powered projects. However if there had been focus on moving decisively to a renewable energy future R and D would have been intensified.

In a more staged transition one wouldn't have to bet the house on the first technologies that came out of the block. However a decent carbon tax would have sent market signals that encouraged these technologies and discouraged fossil fuels. That never happened.

View attachment 178089

Evolution of solar PV module cost by data source, 1970-2020 – Charts – Data & Statistics - IEA

Evolution of solar PV module cost by data source, 1970-2020 - Chart and data by the International Energy Agency.

www.iea.org

Battery technology, grid connect inverter technology etc to support it wasn't available also, it would be nice if things were simple, they never are.
I think we are doing exceptionally well, but we are getting to the pointy end, where the stability and reliability issues come to the fore.
The other issues is industry decarbonising.

 

[basilio]

Battery technology, grid connect inverter technology etc to support it wasn't available also, it would be nice if things were simple, they never are.

They never are simple.
I was living in Northern NSW in the 80's . There was a a very effective off the grid PV industry operational which enabled thousands of people to have an electric household with Solar panels, inverters and batteries.

It was excellent value when compared to the costs of bringing poles and wires to more isolated areas. The technology existed then and has moved with the times.

FAQs

Rainbow Power Company has always openly shared tips & tricks, how-to's and our own experiences.

www.rpc.com.au

About Us - Creating Solar Solutions Since 1987 | Rainbow Power Company

Rainbow Power Company is an unlisted public company established in 1987 to promote and provide high-quality renewable energy sources. We aim to inspire a people-led clean energy future to reduce global emissions. We design, manufacture, install and manage cost efficient Off-Grid and On-Grid...

www.rpc.com.au

 

[sptrawler]

They never are simple.
I was living in Northern NSW in the 80's . There was a a very effective off the grid PV industry operational which enabled thousands of people to have an electric household with Solar panels, inverters and batteries.

It was excellent value when compared to the costs of bringing poles and wires to more isolated areas. The technology existed then and has moved with the times.

FAQs

Rainbow Power Company has always openly shared tips & tricks, how-to's and our own experiences.

www.rpc.com.au

About Us - Creating Solar Solutions Since 1987 | Rainbow Power Company

Rainbow Power Company is an unlisted public company established in 1987 to promote and provide high-quality renewable energy sources. We aim to inspire a people-led clean energy future to reduce global emissions. We design, manufacture, install and manage cost efficient Off-Grid and On-Grid...

www.rpc.com.au

There is a huge difference between having an isolated house off grid, or a caravan off grid and having millions of solar/inverter installations working in synch with each other and dealing with load shedding and system fault currents etc.
I'm actually surprised how quickly we have moved along with the process, it is a credit to the technical people IMO.

Timeline of solar cells - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

2000–2019[edit]​

• 2003 - George Bush has a 9 kW PV system and a solar thermal systems installed on grounds keeping building at the White House[24]
• 2004 - California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger proposed Solar Roofs Initiative for one million solar roofs in California by 2017.[25]
• 2004 - Kansas Governor Kathleen Sebelius issued a mandate for 1,000 MWp renewable electricity in Kansas by 2015 per Executive Order 04-05.
• 2006 - Polysilicon use in photovoltaics exceeds all other polysilicon use for the first time.
• 2006 - California Public Utilities Commission approved the California Solar Initiative (CSI), a comprehensive $2.8 billion program that provides incentives toward solar development over 11 years.[26]
• 2006 - New World Record Achieved in Solar Cell Technology - New Solar Cell Breaks the "40 Percent Efficient" Sunlight-to-Electricity Barrier.[27]
• 2007 - Construction of Nellis Solar Power Plant, a 15 MW PPA installation.
• 2007 - The Vatican announced that in order to conserve Earth's resources they would be installing solar panels on some buildings, in "a comprehensive energy project that will pay for itself in a few years."[28]
• 2007 - University of Delaware claims to achieve new world record in Solar Cell Technology without independent confirmation: 42.8% efficiency.[29]
• 2007 - Nanosolar ships the first commercial printed CIGS, claiming that they will eventually ship for less than $1/watt.[30] However, the company does not publicly disclose the technical specifications or current selling price of the modules.[31]
• 2008 - New record achieved in solar cell efficiency. Scientists at the U.S. Department of Energy's National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL) have set a world record in solar cell efficiency with a photovoltaic device that converts 40.8% of the light that hits it into electricity. However, it was only under the concentrated energy of 326 suns that this was achieved. The inverted metamorphic triple-junction solar cell was designed, fabricated and independently measured at NREL.[32]
• 2010 − IKAROS becomes the first spacecraft to successfully demonstrate solar sail technology in interplanetary space.[33][34]
• 2010 - US President Barack Obama orders installation of additional solar panels and a solar water heater at the White House[35]
• 2011 - Fast-growing factories in China push manufacturing costs down to about $1.25 per watt for silicon photovoltaic modules. Installations double worldwide.[36]
• 2013 - After three years, the solar panels ordered by President Barack Obama were installed on the White House.[37]

Worldwide installed photovoltaic capacity in "watts per capita" by country. Estimated figures for year 2016.

• 2016 - University of New South Wales engineers established a new world record for unfocused sunlight conversion to electricity with an efficiency increase to 34.5% [3]. The record was set by UNSW's Australian Centre for Advanced Photovoltaics (ACAP) using a 28 cm2 four-junction mini-module – embedded in a prism – that extracts the maximum energy from sunlight. It does this by splitting the incoming rays into four bands, using a four-junction receiver to squeeze even more electricity from each beam of sunlight.[38]
• 2016 - First Solar says it has converted 22.1 percent of the energy in sunlight into electricity using experimental cells made from cadmium telluride—a technology that today represents around 5 percent of the worldwide solar power market.[39]
• 2018 - Alta Devices, a US-based specialty gallium arsenide (GaAs) PV manufacturer, claimed to have achieved a solar cell conversion efficiency record of 29.1%, as certified by Germany's Fraunhofer ISE CalLab.[40][41]
• 2018 - The first dedicated solar panel recycling plant in Europe and "possibly in the world" is opened in France.[42]
• 2019 – The world record for solar cell efficiency at 47.1% was achieved by using multi-junction concentrator solar cells, developed at National Renewable Energy Laboratory, Golden, Colorado, USA.[43][additional citation(s) needed] This is above the standard rating of 37% for polycrystalline photovoltaic