Solar dominates new US generating capacity in 2025, and 96% of additions in July

New data from the US government shows that wind and solar has accounted for 90 per cent of new electrical generating capacity across the first seven months of 2025, with solar alone providing 96 per cent of new capacity in July.

According to the latest monthly report from the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC), a total of 3,288 megawatts (MW) of new wind capacity was installed in the first seven months of the year, significantly more than the 2,207 MW of new gas capacity.

But both were dwarfed by the 16,050 MW worth of new utility-scale solar (solar projects greater than 1 MW) that was installed over the same period, which on its own accounted for over 74 per cent of all new capacity added over the first seven months of 2025.

In July, 1,181 MW of new solar was placed into service, accounting for more than 96 per cent of all new generating capacity added during the month.

This also means that solar has been the largest source of new generating capacity added each month for twenty-three consecutive months, according to the Sun Day Campaign, stretching from September 2023.

Over that twenty-three-month period, total utility-scale solar capacity grew from 91.82 gigawatts (GW) to 153.09 GW, a 66 per cent increase, or 61.27 GW.

“No other energy source added anything close to that amount of new capacity,” said the Sun Day Campaign. “Wind, for example, expanded by 10.68-GW while gas increased by just 3.74-GW.”

This continued and dramatic growth of solar and wind has pushed their cumulative share of the available share of US installed utility-scale generating capacity to nearly a quarter (23.23 per cent), with both sources now providing over 11 per cent.

What makes this even more impressive, however, is the fact that at least 25 to 30 per cent of the United States installed solar capacity is in the form of small-scale systems such as rooftop solar, systems that are not reflected in FERC’s data.

The Sun Day Campaign believes that when adding in small-scale solar, the share of installed generating capacity provided by solar and wind would amount to more than a quarter of the country’s total.

And when adding in hydropower (7.61 per cent), biomass (1.07 per cent) and geothermal (0.31 per cent), renewables currently account for over one-third of total US generating capacity.

“With one month of Trump’s ‘One Big Beautiful Bill’ now under our belts, renewables continue to dominate capacity additions,” said Ken Bossong, the Sun Day Campaign’s executive director.

“And solar seems poised to hold its lead in the months and years to come.”

FERC’s ‘Energy Infrastructure Update’ reports that net “high probability” additions of solar between August 2025 and July 2028 are expected to total over 92 GW – more than four times the same forecast for wind additions (22.5 GW).

Conversely, FERC is aware of only 35 MW of new nuclear capacity expected to be added over its three-year forecast, natural gas will add only 8 GW, while coal and oil are projected to both contract by 25 GW and 1.5 GW respectively.

Whether the forecast for coal remains such, however, will remain unclear for some time, in the wake of this week’s announcement by the Trump administration of its plans to revive the country’s lagging coal industry.

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