Residential solar energy capacity grew 7% last year, despite the novel coronavirus pandemic, and local installers are turning a profit, the New York Times reports. The big players continue to burn cash — Sunrun and Sunnova lost a combined half a billion dollars in the first nine months of 2020 — but stock prices are soaring. Investors see massive growth potential as well as long-term stability, spurred by climate disasters like those that hit across the U.S. last year and hopes for increased federal incentives, as well as a surprisingly low default rate on financed solar panels during the recession caused by the uncontrolled pandemic. “There is a good business here,” Joseph Osha, an equity research analyst with JMP Securities, told the Times. “The financials are tremendously complex.” (New York Times $)