Power from solar panels increased slightly in 2023

© ANP / Olaf Kraak Fotografie
Total installed solar panel capacity grew less than in 2022. This is the second time in ten years this has happened. The number of solar installations nevertheless continues to grow rapidly, increasing by more than 22 percent in 2023. This is evident from new provisional figures released by Statistics Netherlands (CBS).

In 2023, the installed capacity of solar panels increased by 4.3 gigawatts to 23.9 gigawatt relative to the previous year. This was nearly 40 times more capacity than in 2013. One gigawatt (GW) equals one billion watts. As solar power is not always produced under ideal conditions, the actual amount of power generated is usually lower than the installed capacity.

Over 41 percent of solar capacity installed in dwellings

Homes with solar panels accounted for approximately 10.1 gigawatts of power in 2023, 25 percent up on the previous year (8 gigawatts), generating just over 42 percent of total power in 2023. The remaining 58 percent of installed capacity was contributed by businesses with solar panels. Installed capacity among companies was up by nearly 20 percent relative to 2022.


The total installed capacity in 2023 was spread over 2.8 million installations, more than 2.5 million of which were on dwellings. The average power output of residential solar installations was almost 4 thousand watts at the end of 2023. Although business have far fewer solar installations, the average power per installation was much higher at 61 thousand watts.

Nearly 17 percent of electricity generated by solar panels

Power generated by solar panels has risen again, as it did in recent years. In 2023, solar panels produced nearly 20 thousand gigawatt hours. This is almost as much as the total electricity consumption of all the homes in the Netherlands and nearly 17 percent of the total net electricity production.

In the past two years, electricity production has nearly doubled, with 11.3 thousand gigawatt hours produced by solar panels in 2021. That was not only a result of more solar panels being installed, but also because there were more hours of sunshine than average in 2023.

More than 1 megawatt per square kilometre in 4 out of 10 municipalities

The installed capacity of solar panels varies between municipalities. In 2023, an average of 0.71 megawatts of solar panels per square kilometre was installed in the Netherlands. Total installed capacity in 4 out of 10 municipalities in the Netherlands was more than one megawatt (one million watts). Zwijndrecht was the municipality with the most power per square kilometre, at over 5 megawatts.

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