Australia reaches 4GW’s of installed solar capacity while the USA’s third quarter installs are up 41% from the same quarter in 2013. A decent portion of both figures can be attributed to residential solar power systems.

According to the Australian PV Institute (APVI) installed solar capacity has quadrupled since 2011 with Australia generating around 5.25GW’s of clean electricity each year.

In some suburbs in South Australia and Queensland in particular, more than 40% of homes have solar power installed. Queensland once again has the most solar power installed with a total of 1.25GW’s.

The market had a huge spike between 2010 and 2013, mainly due to government incentives fading out, but even though the market is stabilising there is still a decent upward direction as everyone looks for a way to lower their power bills.

APVI has estimated that 14 000 solar PV systems have been installed in November this year alone. The APVI website has ‘real-time’ maps on their website, funded by ARENA, which shows solar generation across the country.

The USA has installed 1.354MW’s of solar power in quarter 3 of this year, up by 41% from 963MW’s in quarter 3 of 2013. This is the second highest quarter results in USA history according to SEIA/GTM Research U.S. Solar Market Insight report.

“Every three minutes of every single day, the U.S. solar industry is flipping the switch on another completed solar project, benefiting both our economy and the environment,” said Rhone Resch, SEIA president and CEO.

SEIA estimates that installed solar capacity will reach around 6.5GW’s this year – triple the market size of just three years ago.

Over 300MW’s of residential rooftop solar power was switched on in quarter 3 with more than half of it bought without any incentives. Utility scale solar had 825MW’s of solar power installed in quarter 3 of this year up from 540MW’s in the same quarter last year.

“By the end of this year there will be more than 600,000 homes outfitted with solar, and we see no signs of a slowdown next year,” said Shayle Kann, Senior Vice President at GTM Research. “By 2017, we expect the residential sector to be the largest in the U.S. solar market.”

Solar PV capacity had reached 16.1 gigawatts (GW) by the close of the third quarter, with another 1.4 GW of concentrating solar power (CSP) capacity.

The Solar Market Insight Report 2014 Q3 can be viewed here.