Despite Britain’s cloudy weather, there is a rich solar resource available. The solar energy that falls on the UK every year is equivalent to more than seven hundred times the nation’s electricity consumption.
Studies conducted for the Department of Trade and Industry have shown that if solar photovoltaics were deployed wholesale today on homes and offices , they could generate two thirds of the UK’s current electricity production each year8. If photovoltaics were deployed on the available surfaces of commercial buildings, eight per cent of the UK’s electricity could be supplied. With the future development of even more efficient photovoltaic cells, solar power has the potential to generate more electricity than we currently generate and consume today in the UK.