Smoke From US Wildfires Having Minimal Impact on Solar Panel Output

FORT COLLINS, Colo. — Despite the fact the United States experiences an estimated 70,000 wildfires a year, the smoke from these blazes appears to be having little impact on the output of photovoltaic solar panels deployed across the nation, a study from Colorado State University has found.

CSU Postdoctoral Fellow Kimberley Corwin, the lead author on the paper, said as the United States continues to try to increase the amount of solar energy it harvests, her team’s findings could be used to make informed decisions around where to build future commercial-scale solar facilities.

The findings were published in the journal Nature Communications.

The team’s research was based on both modeled and historic data from multiple wildfire seasons. They then compared that data to changes in baseline solar resource availability when wildfire smoke was present.

Their primary interest was to understand wildfire smoke’s impact on irradiance — the amount of solar light making its way to the surface of a panel to be collected. 

What they found was losses of photovoltaic solar resources due to wildfire smoke remained fairly modest outside the immediate areas around active fires, where smoke was thickest.

Comparing wildfire season to season, they also found that power generated by photovoltaic solar panels remained relatively stable — even in extreme fire seasons.

“There has been similar research into specific events — particularly around the larger fires in California,” Corwin said in an interview published on the university’s website.

“Our work, however, goes further and quantifies the effects over large timescales and geographies,” she said. 

Corwin said not only did the team look at wildfires’ direct impact on solar power resources, they also looked at what happens when thick plumes of smoke are transported farther away, as was the case when Washington, D.C., was cloaked in summer smoke for several days in 2023.

The farther the smoke traveled, the team found, the less of a concern it was in terms of prolonged solar power losses.

“That has implications for where upcoming facilities should be placed for long-term efficiency as well as stability with the grid,” Corwin said during the university interview.

She also said that improved battery storage should help further limit short-term impacts to power collection near wildfires. By switching to reserves from batteries, operators could avoid having to use natural gas to make up for power losses from local fires.

Dan can be reached at [email protected] and @DanMcCue