“With this expansion, we unlock the use of satellite imagery for solar potential estimation, resulting in 125 million new buildings with Solar API data across 23 countries.”
Google frames this as help for the Global South. It is an expansion of the Google Maps Platform Solar API, and the early users are solar installers. Satellites are cheaper than aerial imagery and let Google claim 1.9 billion more potential buildings. The error spikes in Chile and the Philippines get blamed on noisy ground truth.