Solar Crisis?

Via Paul Kedrosky a Digitimes article on the current solar panel oversupply.

The Information Network: Planned global solar capacity increases, 2008-2010
Item	2008	2009	2010
Solar consumption (MW)	5,625	4,894	6,215
Solar capacity (MW)	11,722	17,551	24,212
Utilization	48.0%	27.9%	25.7%
Inventory days	71	122	133

Source: The Information Network, compiled by Digitimes, September 2009

Expect prices to drop further "Average selling prices could drop below US$1 per watt in 2010 and US$0.50 in 2011. As many as 50% of the more than 200 solar manufacturers, mired in red ink with current selling prices above US$2.00 per watt, may not survive, The Information Network stated." These price drops will most likely help adoption and the industry leaders.

To put things in perspectives Global Energy Consumption is around 472 quadrillion Btu. (see BP or EIA) which equals to ca 15.8 TWyr as 1 TWyr = 8.76 x 10¹² kWh = 31.54 EJ = 29.89 quad.
Alternatively 1 barrel of crude oil = 6.0 million Btu and 1 million barrels of oil per day = 2.12 quadrillion Btu per year.

Here is the EIA's 2009 take on Solar technologies from which the following chart has been taken: