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From 2007 to 2017, global installed solar photovoltaic power capacity grew by a factor of 50. Practices that were minor, including solar tracking, inverter overloading, and Chinese module manufacturing, became mainstream. Countries including the US and India installed large amounts of solar in warm regions with mean temperatures above 20 °C. The impacts of these developments on greenhouse gas emissions from photovoltaic power have not been analyzed by life cycle assessment in depth. This study helps to fill that gap. A modeling tool is built that integrates photovoltaic life cycle inventories, background emission factors, known physical correlations, and modern photovoltaic performance modeling, including temperature-dependent performance ratios. Using this tool, four novel findings are produced on life cycle greenhouse gas emissions from photovoltaic power, referred to here as carbon intensity. Firstly …