World's Largest Solar Farm Is Up and Running in California

There’s a blatant lack of coverage for solar success stories, so it wouldn’t be surprising if most people aren’t hearing about them.  California’s Topaz project is the largest solar power plant in the world, with a 550 MW capacity, and it is now in full operation.  It is located in San Luis Obispo County and has 9 million solar panels.  Construction began just two years ago.

The electricity produced by the plant will be purchased by Pacific Gas and Electric.  The solar panels were manufactured by First Solar and the project was developed by First Solar.

SEIA says about 200 homes in California are powered for each MW of solar power capacity.  So, for a 550 MW solar plant, about 110,000 homes could be powered when the sun is shining.  First Solar has said this figure could be 160,000 homes in the case of Topaz.

The San Luis Obispo county population is about 276,000.  It might turn out that the majority of this population could be powered by a single solar power plant.

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