NASA images highlight scale of China’s solar rollout

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  New satellite images highlight China's PV expansion in the Gobi Desert. Image: NASA
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  Imaging from the same site in 2012 reveal the swath of development that has taken place over the three-year period. Image: NASA

New images produced by NASA’s Advanced Land Imager (ALI) on the Earth Observing-1 satellite has shed some light on the spread of solar across China’s Gobi Desert.

Just six years after China began construction on its first large-scale PV installation, new inroads have been made across the Gobi — with satellite scans revealing a large growth in solar panels in an area on the outskirts of Dunhuang in northwestern China’s Gansu Province.

In a plot of land that was largely untouched back in 2006, photos show the development of solar panels across the desert in 2012 — while new images from this year revealed that the size of the PV facility has increased three-fold over the last three years.

According to China Daily, Gansu Province’s total installed solar capacity hit 5.2GW in 2014, while the National Energy Administration (NEA) noted in February 2015 that the China installed 10.6GW of solar in 2014.