Money. Jobs. Keeping the planet usable. Last year, globally, solar capacity investment was greater than coal, oil, gas and nuclear combined. This year we’re not sure if investment amount will go up or down, but we do know the total capacity will go up (this 1st quarter value is 10% lower than Q1’2017).

SOURCEBreaking investment down by type, the first quarter saw a 16% fall in the asset finance of utility-scale renewable energy projects worldwide, to $44.3 billion, but there was a 16% rise to $14.3 billion in the funding of small solar systems of less than 1MW. Wind investment showed a rise of 10% in the first quarter to $18.9 billion, while biomass and waste-to-energy declined 29% to $679 million, geothermal rose 39% to $1 billion and small hydro-electric projects of less than 50MW attracted $538 million, down 32%.

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