US Solar Installs Facing Flat Growth — and That’s Before Trump

(Bloomberg) -- The US solar industry is entering a lean cycle, with the pace of installations expected to largely plateau through the end of the decade — and that’s before taking into account any changes coming from President-elect Donald Trump.

After a period of frenetic growth for US solar — with the rate of new deployments sporting double-digit growth in four of the last five years — installations in 2024 will slip 1.8% to 40.5 gigawatts, according to a report released Wednesday from Wood Mackenzie and the Solar Energy Industries Association. Over the next five years, expansion will be essentially flat, with average annual growth of around 2%.

“Annual installation forecasts would be higher if not for limitations the industry faces,” Michelle Davis, head of solar research at Wood Mackenzie and lead author of the report, said in a statement. Developers continue to face external challenges including labor issues and long waits to connect projects to the grid. 

And then there’s the question of Trump, who has been hostile to clean energy. The report based its conclusions on current policies, the authors said, rather than factoring in how the new administration might change the environment for solar. Trump has pledged to pull back portions of the Democrats’ signature climate law that he calls a “green new scam.” 

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There’s also growing uncertainty over what further tariffs could mean for renewable companies, which may import components. President Joe Biden’s climate policies have helped revive domestic manufacturing, with US panel-production capacity now reaching close to 40 gigawatts. When every plant is running at full tilt, that would be almost enough to supply the entire market, according to the report. 

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