US installs 50 MW PV in April

The U.S. Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) has released its April 2015 Energy Infrastructure Update. In it, it says 49.7 MW of PV was installed in April across six systems, including Algonquin Power Company’s 40 MW Bakersfield Solar Project in California, TerraForm Power Inc.’s two solar projects totaling 4.6 MW in Maryland, Houghton College’s 2.5 MW project, SolarCity Corp’s 1.3 MW Halfmoon Solar Project and Consolidated Edison Solutions Inc.’s 1.3 MW Port Richmond Waste Water Treatment Solar Project, all in New York.

Overall, FERC states that 362 MW of PV were installed across 41 systems. Nothing was installed in March, while February saw 16 MW installed across eight systems, and January, 70 MW across five systems. Overall, cumulative installed capacity is said to be 12.26 GW.

In comparison to last year, where 937 MW across 102 systems, PV deployment has slowed considerably. See table for an overview:

According to the Solar Energies Industry Association (SEIA) a total of 35.4 GW of PV projects over one MW in size are either in operation (8.3 GW), under construction (3.4 GW) or under development (23.7 GW). It forecasts that by the end of 2016, 40 GW will be installed. Meanwhile, it predicts that all U.S. solar sectors will see 25-50% market growth by 2016.