Issue Brief: End-Of-Life Challenges Facing Renewable Energy Facilities

BACKGROUND:

The first wind and solar farms in the United States were built in 1980 and 1982, respectively. The United States built the world's very first wind farm, which was capable of producing only 600 kWh of electricity, while the first solar farm in the U.S. could produce only 1 MW of electricity.

Over the past 40 years, the US has aggressively researched, invested in, and installed renewable capacity to the point where the US has 102.8 GW of installed solar capacity and 118 GW of installed wind capacity. This represents over 550,000 acres of solar installations and 67,000 individual wind turbines in the United States. These remarkable numbers continue to grow and are driving down carbon emissions and providing cleaner power generation.