Costs and Economy
Costs of production have been reduced in recent years for more widespread use through production and technological advances. As of 2011, the cost of PV has fallen well below that of nuclear power and is set to fall further. The average retail price of solar cells fell to $2.43/watt. For large-scale installations, prices below $1.00/watt are now common. Crystal silicon solar cells have largely been replaced by less expensive multicrystalline silicon solar cells, and thin film silicon solar cells have also been developed recently at lower costs of production. Although they are reduced in energy conversion efficiency from single crystalline "siwafers", they are also much easier to produce at comparably lower costs.
Read more about this topic: Photovoltaic System
Famous quotes containing the words costs and/or economy:
“To exercise power costs effort and demands courage. That is why so many fail to assert rights to which they are perfectly entitled—because a right is a kind of power but they are too lazy or too cowardly to exercise it. The virtues which cloak these faults are called patience and forbearance.”
—Friedrich Nietzsche (1844–1900)
“Even the poor student studies and is taught only political economy, while that economy of living which is synonymous with philosophy is not even sincerely professed in our colleges. The consequence is, that while he is reading Adam Smith, Ricardo, and Say, he runs his father in debt irretrievably.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)