Most Americans would turn to solar energy

When planning and thinking about renewable energy future for your country it is always important to know public opinion, and the public opinion in United States suggests that vast majority of Americans wants to see further development of solar power across the whole country

92% percent of Americans think that it’s important for the country to develop and use solar power, making this alternative and renewable energy source look very popular.

Even political parties seem to be agreeing on this one, with 89% of Republicans, 94% of Democrats and 93% of Independents agreeing that solar energy is an important aim that definitely deserves much bigger emphasis in years ahead.


The 2009 Schott Solar Barometer study, conducted by independent firm that does the polls Kelton Research, found that 77% of respondents also believe the federal government should make solar power development a national priority. Nearly half of people questioned are considering solar power options for their home or business, while 70% of asked people hope to make the switch to solar energy in the next five years. However, only 3% of them already use sun for energy.

They would also asked what they would choose for their preferred source of energy if they would be elected as the U.S. president: 43% of respondents would decide for solar, 17% would've picked wind, and only 12% asked would decide for traditional natural gas while 10% would select nuclear.

But if we look at this data more we can see that only 12% of those polled could say that they were extremely well informed about solar power while 74% said they wished they knew more about solar energy options which definitely imply that solar power is lately getting lots of positive media reaction.

All energy experts agree that solar energy is the largest available energy source for the United States, though it's potential is still negligibly used. However this looks to be changing and the reports from 2008 suggest how solar energy deployment has increased at a record pace in the United States in the last year. If current trend continues solar power's contribution to total U.S. energy sector could grow to 10% of the nation's power needs by 2025. If you look at the all available media you can see that large-scale U.S. solar power facilities are becoming commonplace in many parts of the United States, especially in Arizona and California that lead U.S. with the number of solar energy projects.

U.S. has also the largest solar power plant in the world, namely the MW SEGS thermal power plant, located in California, with 354 MW installed capacity, and due to the eight year extension of the 30% solar tax credit, it is estimated that an additional 28,000 megawatts (MW) of solar power will be installed by the end of 2016.

Since the year 2000 solar energy has been really expanding in United States, growing at an incredible average pace of 40% per year so when you look at this data it is really not hard to conclude why public would opt for solar energy as the primary renewable energy source.

Solar power has all signs of bright future in years ahead. Estimates say that in the next seven years solar energy should create 440,000 jobs, 28 gigawatts of solar power, and lead to a total $300 billion investment in solar energy.