Solar panel installations hit a total 629 GW last year–an increase of 12 percent from 2018. It was also a lot—really a lot—of panels. And in a few years, these panels could become a major waste management headache. Solar panels vary in size and capacity, but here is an example of the relation between size—and number—and capacity. A solar power installation with a capacity of just 5 kW, for instance, could be made up of 20 panels, each with a capacity of 250 W or 16 panels, each with a capacity of 300 W. So, it takes 16 to 20 panels for a 5-kW installation. One gigawatt of power equals one million kilowatts. If we take the larger-size, smaller-number panel installation from above, it would need 3.2 panels per kW of capacity. Now multiply this by the global solar capacity added just last year, which was 114.9 GW. We […]