Scotland provided 126% of electricity needs of all its homes this fall through sustainable energy

Scotland’s solar PV panels, solar hot water panels, and wind turbines generated 126 percent of the electricity needs of energy its 3,045,000 homes, accruing a total of 982,842MWh. This figure is monumental in it was a direct result from a multitude of sustainable energy sources, not simply wind, meaning that success cannot be attributed to one-time factors such as hurricanes.

The sun was responsible for providing homes in Edinburgh outfitted with solar PV panels with 46% of their electricity needs and homes outfitted with solar hot water panels with 41% of their hot water needs, according to the WeatherEnergy website. The site is updated daily with information outlining how much energy UK’s photovoltaic and solar thermal systems could have provided for the week before, in addition to how many homes could have been powered by wind energy from turbines.

Interestingly enough, Scotland produces a third of the UK’s renewable energy but houses only a tenth of its population. Partially responsible is the fact that Scotland is one of the windiest countries in Europe (although wind power is only a fraction of the nation’s total sustainable energy). For example, the UK’s largest windfarm —the Whitelee Windfarm — is located 20 minutes from Glasgow, and produces 539 megawatts of electricity from its 215 turbines. That’s enough electricity to power 298,837 homes in a year based on the expected average capacity of 27 percent and the average annual domestic usage of 4,266kWm.