I have a solar array on my roof. If I find my house in OSM, there's a lightning bolt icon indicating there's a solar array present. Not only that, but the exact layout of the panels in my roof is shown. I never submitted this info to anyone, Google Maps Satellite view doesn't show them. I'm really curious where OSM got such detailed data.
You don’t need to guess, you can check the history for any object in OSM.
Editing to clarify there are two places where source info might be stored. One is as a source tag on the object itself. The other is as a source on the change set in which your solar array was added.
TIL. And, to confirm what someone else said in a now-deleted comment, a user used Bing aerial data to add it.
Exactly. OpenStreetMap has a big community which is contributing. And every change can be reviewed. Or reverted if its wrong. In the changeset there should also be a source tag like "aerial imagery", the Editor which was used and also which background imagery was used during edit. For example Bing Maps allows their high resolution imagery to be used for OpenStreetMap.
Shouldn't solar panels be mapped if and only if they consistent of a separate structure and not part of the roof?