Wildfire smoke has “minimal” impact on U.S. solar power generation outside of active fire zones, according to a new study from Colorado State University.
The study, published Monday in Nature Communications, comes as wildfires rage across Los Angeles, forcing the evacuation of tens of thousands of people. Climate change is creating a longer and more severe wildfire season across the U.S., motivating researchers to examine the impact of wildfire smoke on solar photovoltaic systems, said Kimberley Corwin, the lead author of the study.
“As those wildfire seasons are intensifying, we see increases in smoke production and smoke really traveling across large swaths of the country reaching from California all the way across to New York City,” said Corwin, who is a postdoctoral fellow at Colorado State University.
Researchers used both historical and modeled data from multiple wildfire seasons to analyze the impact on solar power. They examined global horizontal irradiance, the total amount of solar radiation that reaches a solar panel. A decrease in GHI indicates a decrease in solar energy generation.
