How much greenhouse gas emissions are reduced by solar energy?
Australia has some of the most greenhouse polluting power stations in the world, with CO2 emissions per energy produced marginally better than India but worse than China and more than twice as high as the EU. The upshot of this is that reducing the amount of grid power required in Australia will have a greater effect reducing climate change than almost anywhere else in the world. A 1kW system will save approximately 1,400kg of CO2 emissions every year. By comparison a hybrid car (highly recommended) will save approximately 1,240kg of CO2 emissions per year (based on 20,000km/y) at an additional cost of $12,200 (based on Honda Civic). The table at the top of this page shows the annual emissions savings for different sized PV systems.
