Added Renewable Electricity Generation Surpassed Fossil Fuel Plants in 2015

October 26, 2016 – For the first time renewable energy growth exceeded all other electrical power generation technologies added in the last year. States Dr. Fatih Birol, Executive Director, International Energy Agency (IEA), “we are witnessing the transformation of energy system markets led by renewables” and that emerging countries are taking the lead over industrialized countries.

The graph below shows that the most significant investment in renewables is happening in China with the United States and Europe trailing.

China and India are seen as the major engines of future renewable energy growth. States Birol, “China alone is responsible for about 40% of growth in the next five years.”

In 2015 153 Gigawatts of renewable electricity infrastructure was added to the world. That is 15% greater than Canada’s total energy generation capacity. China expects to add double that in the next five years. India is slated to increase its renewable capacity by 76 Gigawatts during the same five year period.

The big increase is coming from onshore wind turbines with 63 Gigawatts of new capacity. Solar accounts for 49 Gigawatts of the new energy infrastructure.

“The cost of wind dropped by about one third in the last five to six years, and that of solar dropped by 80%,” states Birol. This has happened while world oil and natural gas prices have also gone down but not to the same degree as wind and solar energy.

The IEA expects to see net new power generation capacity to become even more skewed towards renewable energy sources forecasting 60% market share by 2021.

It sounds like remarkable progress but in fact remains a small part of the total global energy mix with green energy accounting for 28% of power generation by 2021. How much of that will come from wind, solar, tidal and geothermal? Not much compared to hydroelectricity which remains the largest net new source of renewable power generation.

The biggest benefit in the growth of renewables is the decline in coal-fired cumulative capacity growth which now trails wind and solar power net new growth.

What continues to hold back solar and wind? The energy industry which has relied on thermal-power generation states that it is the predictability issue. The wind doesn’t always blow and the sun doesn’t always shine. They talk about the lack of a storage infrastructure to provide feed-in power because of the variability of these renewable technologies.

The IEA points to the lack of sufficient commitment from government with policies that put an increasing price on carbon pollution, and also to investor concerns that changing energy infrastructure could hurt their return on investment.

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