Solarpunk was ‘born’ with these notes in 2014:

2014 – Solarpunk: Notes toward a manifesto – Adam Flynn – Dominios, públicos y acceso

Or perhaps it ‘started’ in 2008… or 2011:

While the idea of solarpunk is attributed to an artist and blogger, Olivia Louise, a quick search on the Internet proves that this term first appeared in 2008. That year, on a blog Republic of the Bees, there appeared an article in which blog creators describes their own idea of solarpunk. It is explained as a science fiction and fantasy genre derived from steampunk but with one notable difference – solarpunk ideas and technology are able to become real and leave the sphere of imagination. The project itself did not seem to interest anyone – a low number of blog followers may be the cause of that. Between 2008 and 2014 solarpunk was briefly mentioned on writers’ forum AbsoluteWrite in 2011 as a way of combining solar energy with cyberpunk aesthetic and general setting.

Apart those mentions, 2014 is believed to be the real beginning of solarpunk as a literary genre and social movement – for two reasons. The first call for change was given by Arizona State University in a form of Project Hieroglyph. It was started in 2011 by a manifesto written by Neal Stephenson.

In his manifesto Stephenson directly attacks modern science. He accuses it of stagnation, the inability to dream big. He uses history of space exploration as an example, showing that despite innovative technology having been researched for decades, even the most advanced space programs still operate on similar methods to those used half a century ago.

What is more, Stephenson believes that science fiction literature will be relevant in solving this problem of stagnation in science…

At the end, it is worth mentioning – to show that solarpunk is a subject difficult to discuss, but nonetheless very much worth discussing – that Internet users up until not long ago argued whether solarpunk is even a legitimate genre. In April 2017, an article on solarpunk was deleted from Wikipedia after the discussion between website contributors, who decided it was lacking substantial coverage. Two years later the movement was getting more and more interest from academic circles and social media platforms, resulting in creating in May 2019 a new solarpunk page on Wikipedia. Just yesterday (March 28) solarpunk was discussed during a panel about climate disasters in fantastic at Polish online fan convention Kwarantankon 2020, proving the genre’s growing role in our culture.

Solarpunk as an Optimistic Vision of the Future: An Introduction

In summary, here’s a reference guide from 2018:

SOLARPUNK : A REFERENCE GUIDE. The below was compiled by… | by Jay Springett | Solarpunks | Medium

Here are more notes for a manifesto from 2020:

Solarpunk Cities: Notes for a Manifesto | Reckoning

And here is the manifesto from 2019:

A Solarpunk Manifesto (English) – ReDes – Regenerative Design