GoKawiilThe big picture: Cheap solar panels are reshaping the way electricity systems operate from Pakistan to Australia. Businesses and households are generating more of their own power, reducing daytime grid purchases while still relying on utilities to maintain networks and supply electricity when solar output falls. The shift is making demand harder to forecast and prompting grid operators to invest in better system visibility, storage, and new pricing models.
At Bestway Cement's plant in Chakwal, Pakistan, solar already supplies more than a quarter of the electricity used to make cement. The company has 26MW installed and expects to add another 6.34MW by the end of the year.
"It's the only way we can compete," Abdul Waheed, the plant's general manager, told the Financial Times. "Our rivals have already gone in this direction."
The economics are driving the shift. Solar panels that sold for $5 to $6 per watt around 2000 now cost about 12 cents per watt, according to Dave Jones, co-founder of Ember. China's manufacturing expansion is behind much of that decline. Wood Mackenzie estimates Chinese solar manufacturing capacity at roughly 1.36 terawatts.
The lower prices have made rooftop and on-site solar practical in countries where power is costly or unreliable. By the end of 2025, installed small-scale solar capacity worldwide had reached nearly 1.2 terawatts, according to the Energy Institute's Statistical Review of World Energy. While solar does not generate at full capacity around the clock, the installed total is about three times the size of the global nuclear fleet.
Credit: The Financial Times
Businesses have been among the fastest adopters because their peak electricity use often occurs during sunny hours. Ember expects Africa to add about 17GW of solar this year, largely through smaller systems at factories and commercial sites.
In the Philippines, rooftop solar capacity may have nearly doubled in the 12 months through April, Ember says. Meralco, the country's electricity distributor, said rooftop systems generated 372 gigawatt hours in the first six months of the year. Ember estimates that residential systems can now pay for themselves there in a little more than three years.
India is scaling rooftop systems through a national subsidy program launched in February 2024. The program has installed panels on more than 5 million homes and is adding about 500,000 homes a month, according to Tata Power chief executive Praveer Sinha. "It's a democratization of the use of electricity," he said.
But the same trend is putting pressure on utilities. Customers who can afford solar systems and batteries often use less grid power. That reduces utility revenue even though those customers still rely on the grid at night, during cloudy weather, and when their batteries run low.
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