However, during the winter the sun produces less energy, so solar panels don't have near as much potential energy they can absorb. The main driver for solar power output is the amount of particles of light, called photons, which is more prevalent during the summer months.

Solar panels absord more of the sun's energy at lower temperatures, therefor they operate more efficiently in the winter. That being said, solar panels actually work more efficiently in cold temperatures, but a key point is to know efficiency and power output are two completely different things. It's important to realize temperature doesn't directly play a major factor in a solar panel's power output. These are large installations that provide power to the electric grid as a whole. When we say utility scale solar power, we are referring to solar farms generally in ther > 5 MegaWatt size.

Does Winter affect Utility Scale Solar Farms? In order to better outline this we are going to separate this out by utility scale solar, residential solar panels, and home solar lighting. In this piece, you should leave with the ultimate knowledge on how winter can affect solar panels and solar energy in general.

One of the most common questions we get here at Solar Us, is ' do solar panels work in the winter?' Or ' do solar lights work in the winter?' We touch on this a little on our Solar Power FAQ page, but since we offer so many products relating to these topics, we thought it would be a great idea to do a special piece on the effects of winter on solar power.

Do solar lights work in the winter