Renew Extra Weekly

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UK Budget Reactions- and green job futures

Ed Miliband’s Department for Energy Security & Net Zero did quite well in the October Budget , with a 35% capital uplift for 2025/26, although not much of that will go to new renewables- just £134m to support the delivery of port infrastructure to facilitate floating offshore wind and backing for 11 green hydrogen projects in industrial sites around the country. That’s welcome, so is the £1bn for small scale local renewable projects. But it’s still quite small compared to the main funding allocations for 2025-26, which went to Carbon Capture, Utilisation and Storage, a massive £3.9bn, and to nuclear, with £2.7bn for the initial phase of the Sizewell plant programme, plus, announced later, around £1bn for the winning Small Modular Reactors in the UK SMR competition . However, there was also, as the first step in the Warm Homes Plan, a provision of over £1 bn in 2025, and to provide supply chain certainty, a guarantee of investment of an initial £3.4 bn towards heat decarbonisati

IEA World Energy Outlook- renewables lead, but SMRs lag

The latest World Energy Outlook from the International Energy Agency is very optimistic. In all the new IEA scenarios, growth in global energy demand slows thanks to efficiency gains, electrification and a rapid buildout of renewables. In the STEPS scenario, based on the current prevailing policy settings in countries around the world, the IEA claims that ‘clean energy meets virtually all growth in energy demand in aggregate in the STEPS between 2023 and 2035, leading to an overall peak in demand for all three fossil fuels before 2030, although trends vary widely across countries at different stages of economic and energy development’. However, the IEA adds that almost everywhere ‘ electricity demand grows much faster than overall energy demand, thanks to existing uses, notably cooling, and new ones such as electric mobility and data centres’. It says that ‘by 2030, nearly every other car sold in the world is electric, although delays in the roll-out of charging infrastructure or in

Green jobs and green skills - the state of play

In 2023, the global renewable energy sector witnessed a record increase in jobs, rising from 13.7 million in 2022 to 16.2 million . China led with an estimated 7.4 million renewable energy jobs, representing 46% of the global total. The EU followed with 1.8 million jobs, while Brazil had 1.56 million. The US and India each contributed nearly one million jobs. The strongest growth was seen in the solar photovoltaics sector, which accounted for 7.2 million jobs globally, with 4.6 million jobs located in China. However, as I have reported in earlier posts , green skill shortages may slow progress and, exploring this issue in the UK context, an Imperial College Futures Lab briefing paper has investigated the Net-Zero job skills and training requirements in the UK’s energy system. It notes that the governments advisory Committee on Climate Change (CCC) estimates that between 135,000 and 725,000 net new jobs could be created in the UK by 2030 directly in low-carbon sectors, this wide ran

Renewables- the way ahead led by China

Global renewables are heading to surpass 4TW, with a cumulative total of 3.9 TW having been installed by the start of the year, according to IRENA , the International Renewable Energy Agency, this growth being led by China now at 1.45 TW. And the International Energy Agency ( IEA ) is quite optimistic about the future. In its Renewable 2024 review, it says that global renewable capacity is expected to grow by 2.7 times by 2030, although it warns that still falls short of ‘tripling’, as was agreed as a goal by nearly 200 countries at the COP28 climate summit. The IEA says that ‘considering existing policies and market conditions, our main case sees 5,500 gigawatts (GW) of new renewable capacity becoming operational by 2030. This implies that global renewable capacity additions will continue to increase every year, reaching almost 940 GW annually by 2030 – 70% more than the record level achieved last year. Solar PV and wind together account for 95% of all renewable capacity growth throu

Nuclear - not the way ahead

‘Renewable energies consistently outperform nuclear power in terms of cost and deployment speed and are therefore chosen over nuclear power in most countries’ – so says this years independent World Nuclear Industry status report (WNISR). It notes that in 2023, 5 new nuclear reactors (5 GW) started up and 5 were closed (6 GW), capacity thus declining by 1 GW. So overall it says that nuclear energy’s share of global commercial gross electricity generation declined from 9.2 % to 9.1%, little more than half of its peak of 17.5 % in 1996. In 2023, total investment in non-hydro renewable electricity capacity reached a record US$623 billion, 27 times the reported global investment decisions for the construction of nuclear power plants, with solar and wind power capacities growing by 73% and 51%, respectively. Nevertheless, some countries are still pushing on with new nuclear, despite its poor economics , including the UK and Sweden. Sweden has mooted a new financing model but its critics say

The politics of the transition – a tough ask

There are plenty of political issues to explore, if you are so inclined, in terms of how to move to a sustainable energy future. As Richard Heinberg argues, so far, we are not doing very well: ‘Despite trillions of dollars having been spent on renewable energy infrastructure, carbon emissions are still increasing , not decreasing, and the share of world energy coming from fossil fuels is only slightly less today than it was 20 years ago. In 2024, the world is using more oil, coal, and natural gas than it did in 2023. While the U.S. and many European nations have seen a declining share of their electricity production coming from coal, the continuing global growth in fossil fuel usage and CO2 emissions overshadows any cause for celebration.’ So, he says, driven by growth in energy demand, ‘we are not experiencing a real energy transition. All that humanity is doing is adding energy from renewable sources to the growing amount of energy it derives from fossil fuels’. To change this dire