Solar Panel Acres Per Mw

Small single axis photovoltaic systems require an average 2 9 acres per 1 000 megawatt hours or 3 8 acres when considering all unused area that falls inside the project boundary.

Solar panel acres per mw.

Redefining its calculations nrel determines that a large fixed tilt solar pv plant requires 2 8 acres per gwh year of generation. The cost of land for 1 mw plant will therefore translate to 2 500 per month on average. For direct land use requirements the capacity weighted average is 7 3 acre mwac with 40 of power plants within 6 and 8 acres mwac. Approximately 25 acres of land is required for every 5 megawatts mw of installation enough to power 1 515 homes1.

If you were to use panels that were a higher wattage such as 320 watts you would need significantly less panels to achieve the same one mw of power. Put another way a pv plant spanning 32 acres could power 1 000 households. A general rule of thumb. Therefore we can say that for every acre the plant produces an average of 0 357 gwh or 357 mwh of energy per year.

A solar farm requires 4 7 acres of land per megawatt mw of capacity. When it comes to solar energy per acre a photovoltaic solar plant which on average produces 1 gwh per year will require around 2 8 acres of land. On a capacity weighted basis total land requirements average out to 8 9 acres mwac and 7 3 acres mwac for direct land use. Thus a 1 mw solar power plant with crystalline panels about 18 efficiency will require about 4 acres while the same plant with thin film technology 12 efficiency will require about 6 acres.

So how much money can a solar farm make for property owners. Other published estimates of solar direct land use generally fall within these ranges. 8 9 acres mwac with 22 of power plants within 8 and 10 acres mwac. One mw is equal to one million watts.

If you divide this one million watts by 200 watts per panel we are left with needing 5 000 solar panels to produce one mw of power. The simple thumb rule is high efficiency solar panels will require less area for the same mw capacity than lower efficiency panels. For example the solar farm land requirements for a 1 megawatt solar plant is around 5 acres.