HIGHLIGHTS
- NEWLY-RELEASED FERC DATA REVEAL SOLAR + WIND WERE >88% OF NEW CAPACITY IN 2025
- FOR 28 MONTHS STRAIGHT, SOLAR HAS PROVIDED MORE NEW GENERATING CAPACITY THAN ANY OTHER ENERGY SOURCE
- OVER THE NEXT THREE YEARS, SOLAR & WIND PROJECTED TO ADD ANOTHER 106-GW
A review by the SUN DAY Campaign of data very belatedly released by the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) reveals that solar accounted for >72% of U.S. electrical generating capacity added during 2025, with another 16% provided by wind. Solar continues to dominate new capacity additions and has held the lead among all energy sources for 28 consecutive months. As a consequence, installed utility-scale solar capacity now exceeds the individual capacities of wind, hydropower, and nuclear power. Further, FERC foresees solar adding another 86 gigawatts (GW) over the next three years during which time solar capacity will also surpass that of coal.
Solar was 83% of new generating capacity in December and >72% in 2025:
In its latest monthly "Energy Infrastructure Update" report (with data through December 31, 2025), FERC says 17 "units" of solar totaling 993 megawatts (MW) were placed into service in December, accounting for 83.2% of all new generating capacity added during the month. The balance was provided by the 200-MW Top Hat Wind Energy Center in Logan County, IL.
The newest solar facilities include the 325-MW Iron Pine Solar Project in Pine County, MN; the 201-MW Morrow Lake Solar & Storage Project in Frio County, TX; and the 160-MW CPV Backbone Solar Project in Garrett County, MD.
The 710 units of utility-scale (i.e., >1-MW) solar added during 2025 total 26,556-MW and were 72.6% of the total new capacity placed into service by all sources.
Solar has now been the largest source of new generating capacity added each month for 28 months straight: September 2023 - December 2025. During that period, total utility-scale solar capacity grew from 91.82-GW to 164.53-GW. No other energy source added anything close to that amount of new capacity. Wind, for example, expanded by 13.40-GW while natural gas' net increase was just 6.83-GW. [1]
As a consequence, the installed generating capacity of utility-scale solar is now 164.5-GW, or 12.2% of the total, and has surpassed that of wind (161.1-GW/11.9%), nuclear power (104.39-GW/7.7%), and hydropower (102.09-GW/7.5%).
Wind capacity additions in 2025 exceeded those of natural gas:
In 2025, new wind provided 5,763-MW of capacity additions - an increase of 26% compared to 2024 and more than the new capacity provided by natural gas (4,179-MW). Wind thereby accounted for 15.7% of all new capacity added during 2025.
Renewables were more than 88% of new capacity added in 2025:
In 2025, wind and solar (joined by 4-MW of hydropower and 6-MW of biomass) accounted for 88.4% of all new generating capacity while natural gas added just 11.4%. The balance of net capacity additions came from oil (66-MW) and waste heat (17-MW).
Solar + wind are a quarter of U.S. generating capacity; all renewables combined are over a third:
Taken together, wind and solar constitute nearly a quarter (24.1%) of the U.S.'s total available installed utility-scale generating capacity.
Moreover, more than one-fourth of U.S. solar capacity is in the form of small-scale (e.g., rooftop) systems that are not reflected in FERC's data. [2] Including that additional solar capacity would bring the share provided by solar + wind to more than 25% of the nation's total.
With the inclusion of hydropower (7.5%), biomass (1.1%) and geothermal (0.3%), renewables currently claim a 33.0% share of total U.S. utility-scale generating capacity. If small-scale solar capacity is included, renewables are now more than one-third of total U.S. generating capacity.
Solar is still on track to become the second largest source of U.S. generating capacity:
FERC reports that net "high probability" net additions of solar over the next three years (i.e., January 2026 - December 2028) total 86,126-MW - an amount more than four times the forecast net "high probability" additions for wind (19,821-MW), the second fastest growing resource. Further, the average annual combined growth by solar and wind during the next three years (35,316-MW/yr.) would closely match that experienced during the last two (35,382-MW/yr.), suggesting no slow-down notwithstanding the hostile policies of the Trump Administration.
FERC also foresees net growth for hydropower (554-MW) and geothermal (102-MW) but a decrease of 116-MW in biomass capacity.
Meanwhile, natural gas capacity would expand by far less - 8,154-MW, and nuclear power would add just 335-MW, while coal is projected to contract by a massive 40,828-MW and oil is forecast to fall by 1,590-MW.
Taken together, the net new "high probability" net utility-scale capacity additions by all renewable energy sources over the next three years - i.e., the Trump Administration's remaining time in office - would total 106,487-MW. On the other hand, the installed capacity of fossil fuels and nuclear power combined would shrink by 33,929-MW.
Should FERC's three-year forecast materialize, by January 1, 2029, utility-scale solar would account for 17.6% of installed U.S. generating capacity - more than any other source besides natural gas (40.6%). Further, the capacity of the mix of all utility-scale renewable energy sources would be almost 39%. Inclusion of small-scale solar - assuming it retains its 25% share of all solar - could push solar's share to over 20% and that of all renewables to over 40% while that of natural gas would drop below 39%.
In fact, the numbers for renewables could be significantly higher.
FERC notes that "all additions" (net) for utility-scale solar over the next three years could be as high as 240,152-MW while those for wind could total 64,669-MW. Hydro's net additions could reach 9,513-MW while geothermal and biomass could increase by 575-MW and 44-MW respectively. Such growth by renewable sources would significantly exceed that of natural gas (36,628-MW).
"FERC's data confirm that very strong growth in electrical generation by solar and wind dominated the first year of the Trump Administration," noted the SUN DAY Campaign's executive director Ken Bossong. "Equally important, the trend lines are on track to continue during the next three years notwithstanding efforts by the White House to reverse course."
Source:
FERC's 8-page "Energy Infrastructure Update for December 2025" was posted on March 31, 2026. The link to the full report can be found at: https://cms.ferc.gov/media/energy-infrastructure-update-december-2025.
For the information cited in this update, see the tables entitled "New Generation In-Service (New Build and Expansion)," "Total Available Installed Generating Capacity," and "Generation Capacity Additions and Retirements."
FERC notes: "Data derived from Velocity Suite, Hidachi Energy, and Yes Energy. The data may be subject to update."
Notes:
[1] Generating capacity is not the same as actual generation. Fossil fuels and nuclear power usually have higher "capacity factors" than do wind and solar. The U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA) reports capacity factors in calendar year 2025 for nuclear power, combined-cycle natural gas plants and coal were 91.0%, 58.4%, and 48.7% respectively while those for wind and utility-scale solar PV were 34.2% and 24.4%. See Tables 6.07.A and 6.07.B in EIA's most recent "Electric Power Monthly" report.
[2] While FERC does not provide capacity data for small-scale solar, the EIA does. In its latest "Electric Power Monthly" report issued on March 24, 2026, EIA reported that as of January 31, 2026, installed solar capacity totaled 213,884.4-MW of which 59,950.1-MW (i.e., 28.0%) was estimated to have been provided by small-scale solar. See table 6.1 at https://www.eia.gov/electricity/monthly/epm_table_grapher.php?t=table_6_01
The SUN DAY Campaign is a non-profit research and educational organization founded in 1992 to support a rapid transition to 100% reliance on sustainable energy technologies as a cost-effective alternative to nuclear power and fossil fuels and as a solution to climate change.
