“The energy market is $8 trillion and solar is 1% of it today. There will be solar companies with $100 billion market capitalizations in the near future.”

– Frank van Mierlo, CEO of CubicPV

Innovation alert: Solar PV manufacturing is coming back to America

Harnessing solar rays for power generation has the potential to be one of the world’s most important breakthroughs. The sun hits Earth’s atmosphere at 1,366 Watts per square meter, which provides more than enough to power the entire world’s energy needs.

70 years ago, scientists at Bell Labs figured out how to convert that energy from the sun into electricity through the invention of the solar photovoltaic cell (“PV”). Their silicon-based solar cell inventions initially had a 4% efficiency, meaning only 4% of the total energy from the sunlight exposed to the cell was converted into useful electricity.

In this podcast, we break down the rise of solar manufacturing in China, and how U.S.-based companies are reacting to the opportunity to grow into the $8T energy market.