Abstract
Residential solar photovoltaics (PV) are important for a rapid decarbonization strategy. To chart an equitable energy transition, researchers have measured inequalities in residential PV adoption and identified factors that drive group disparities. We know little, however, about people’s experiences after installing solar. Electricity generation differences among PV systems can be substantial and may contribute to inequitable outcomes even as adoption disparities wane. Here we use data measuring actual monthly generation for over 26,000 PV systems installed in Connecticut to identify significant disparities in system output by neighbourhood income and race. We show that the choice of financing model (purchase or leasing) partly explains the observed disparities. We also find that system generation varies significantly across installers, highlighting that firm behaviour contributes to inequitable outcomes. These findings underscore the importance of measuring the quality and the quantity of renewable energy projects to ensure an equitable energy transition.
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Fig. 1: Distribution of financing model choice by low-income status and tract ethno-racial majority.
Fig. 2: Predicted monthly generation by financing model and tract low-income status and tract ethno-racial majority status.
Fig. 3: Monthly generation for a typical solar PV system installed by different companies and the socio-demographic characteristics of census tracts where they installed PV systems, including proportion of installations by tract low-income status and proportion of installations by tract ethno-racial majority status.
Fig. 4: Installations distribution per thousand households by census tract for high- and low-performing companies.
Data availability
Solar PV monthly generation data are made available to the authors by Connecticut Green Bank through a non-disclosure data-sharing agreement and cannot be shared publicly. Interested parties can obtain it under similar terms from Connecticut Green Bank. Demographic data are available through the American Community Survey and can be accessed online.
Code availability
R code for analysis is available via Harvard Dataverse at https://doi.org/10.7910/DVN/ONW5WX.
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Acknowledgements
An earlier version of the paper was presented and received valuable feedback at the 2024 meeting of the American Sociological Association. We thank E. Shrago and the team at the Connecticut Green Bank for their collaboration and for sharing valuable data. This study was supported by a grant from the Climate Positive Energy initiative at the University of Toronto.
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Department of Sociology, University of Toronto, Toronto, Ontario, Canada
Mircea Gherghina & Fedor A. Dokshin
School of Public Policy and Leadership, University of Nevada, Las Vegas, NV, USA
Benjamin Leffel
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Mircea Gherghina
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M.G. and F.A.D. designed the research. B.L. contributed to conceptualization. M.G. performed the analysis. M.G., F.A.D. and B.L. interpreted the results. M.G., F.A.D. and B.L. wrote the paper.
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Correspondence to Mircea Gherghina.
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Gherghina, M., Dokshin, F.A. & Leffel, B. Unequal solar photovoltaic performance by race and income partly reflects financing models and installer choices. Nat Energy (2025). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41560-025-01743-7
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Received:05 July 2024
Accepted:17 February 2025
Published:19 March 2025
DOI:https://doi.org/10.1038/s41560-025-01743-7
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