Renewable Generation Reference Values

22 reference values for renewable generation held in the GreenCalculus MasterBrain, drawn from Photovoltaic Degradation Rates – An Analytical Review and Global Photovoltaic Power Potential by Country. They cover the solar resource available in 19 countries — specific yield in kWh per kWp installed per year — and the annual output degradation of rooftop PV, utility PV and onshore wind. Values are read live from the data layer on every page build. They span 2 units of measurement, which is why the spread below is reported per unit and never blended.

Where these factors are used

Renewable Carbon Payback sets out how these values are applied, and Solar & PPA Carbon Payback Calculator and PCAF Project Finance Calculator draw on them directly. Specific yield is what turns an installed capacity into an annual generation figure, so it sits upstream of every payback and avoided-emissions estimate on the site.

What this page does not carry

The data layer also holds life-cycle emission intensities and embodied-carbon figures for solar and wind — the grams of CO₂e per kWh a panel or turbine carries before it generates anything. Those come from IEA-PVPS Task 12 and IPCC AR5 Working Group III, both of which permit citation but not republication as a table, so 13 rows are withheld here. They are named in the methodology pages that use them, and the calculators read them directly from the data layer. This page carries the 22 rows whose sources permit republication: World Bank Global Solar Atlas and NREL.

What this group contains

Figures are computed per unit and never blended: a median across different units would be arithmetically valid and physically meaningless.

What has changed

Sources, citation & machine access

Cite the upstream publisher for the values themselves. The reference below credits this compilation and, more usefully, pins the edition you read.

Say, Jeremiah (2026). Renewable Generation Reference Values (MasterBrain v2026.110). GreenCalculus. https://greencalculus.com/factors/renewable-generation-reference-values/

Cite this factor group

Values change between editions. Quoting the MasterBrain version is what lets a reader resolve the exact number you used — see the change record above for factors in this group that have moved.

For a reference manager — BibTeX, then RIS:

@misc{greencalculus_renewable_generation_2026,
  author       = {Say, Jeremiah},
  title        = {Renewable Generation Reference Values},
  year         = {2026},
  howpublished = {GreenCalculus},
  note         = {MasterBrain v2026.110},
  url          = {https://greencalculus.com/factors/renewable-generation-reference-values/}
}

TY  - DATA
AU  - Say, Jeremiah
TI  - Renewable Generation Reference Values
PY  - 2026
PB  - GreenCalculus
ET  - MasterBrain v2026.110
UR  - https://greencalculus.com/factors/renewable-generation-reference-values/
ER  - 

Every factor on this page is readable from the open endpoint. No key, no signup:

https://greencalculus.com/wp-json/greencalculus/v1/factors/renewable_generation

curl -s "https://greencalculus.com/wp-json/greencalculus/v1/factors/renewable_generation?limit=500"

import requests
rows = requests.get("https://greencalculus.com/wp-json/greencalculus/v1/factors/renewable_generation", params={"limit": 500}).json()["factors"]
print(len(rows), "factors in renewable_generation")

Or the same rows as a spreadsheet — every factor with its source, the edition it last changed in, and its own link:

https://greencalculus.com/wp-json/greencalculus/v1/factors-export?page=renewable-generation-reference-values

Download this table as CSV

Both responses carry an X-GC-Version header, so a consumer can detect a new edition without diffing the payload. The CSV filename carries the edition too, so two downloads months apart do not collide.

All factors

Last changed names the data-layer edition in which a factor last took a new value, reconstructed from every released edition since v2025.13. A dash means the value has not moved since tracking began — which is the answer to "is the figure I used last year still current?".

Common questions