Peter Martin: When It Comes to Power, Solar Could Leave Nuclear and Everything Else in the Shade

Installed solar capacity is doubling every three years, meaning it has grown tenfold in the past 10 years. The Economist says the next tenfold increase will be the equivalent of multiplying the world's entire fleet of nuclear reactors by eight, in less time than it usually takes to build one of them.

To give an idea of the standing start the industry has grown from, The Economist reports that in 2004 it took the world an entire year to install 1 gigawatt of solar capacity (about enough to power a small city). This year, that's expected to happen every day.

The exponential rise in solar power is really something else, and it encourages me about the future of energy production. I don’t see a future where we use less energy as a society, so making the energy we use clean and abundant is critical.