The International Energy Agency (IEA) is mostly pretty gloomy about energy trends in its new global energy review- although with some exceptions. It says that global energy demand grew by 2.2% in 2024 - faster than the average rate over the past decade. ‘The increase was led by the power sector as electricity demand surged by 4.3%, well above the 3.2% growth in global GDP, driven by record temperatures, electrification & digitalisation’. It says global electricity consumption ‘rose by nearly 1,100 TWh in 2024, more than twice the annual average increase over the past led by China, with more than half of the global increase in electricity demand’.
Globally ‘electricity use in buildings accounted for nearly 60% of overall growth in 2024’, while ‘the installed capacity of data centres globally increased by an estimated 20%, or around 15 GW, mostly in the United States and China’. And it says that ‘energy intensity improvements continued to slow in 2024. After improving at an average rate of around 2% annually between 2010 and 2019, energy intensity improvements slowed to 1.2% per year between 2019 & 2023 and only 1% in 2024.’
However, it is not all bad news. Renewables accounted for most of the growth in global energy supply (38%), followed by natural gas (28%), coal (15%), oil (11%) and nuclear (8%). It noted that ‘new renewables installations hit record levels for the 22nd consecutive year, with around 700 GW of total renewable capacity added in 2024, nearly 80% of which was solar PV. Generation from solar PV and wind increased by a record 670 TWh’ and ‘installed solar PV capacity worldwide reached an estimated 2.2 terawatts’. Together, solar PV and wind ‘accounted for 95% of overall renewable capacity growth in 2024’, while ‘hydropower installations more than doubled to over 25 GW thanks to large projects commissioned in China, Africa and Southeast Asia’.
Meanwhile, it said ‘the continued growth in the uptake of electric vehicles resulted in a rise in electricity use in transport. Global sales of electric cars rose by over 25%, surpassing 17 million units and accounting for one-fifth of all car sales, in line with the IEA’s projections for 2024’. But to the extent that this demand was met by growth in renewables and nuclear, that helped reduce global energy demand - although, ‘after improving at an average rate of around 2% annually between 2010 and 2019, energy intensity improvements slowed to 1.2% per year between 2019 and 2023 and only 1% in 2024.’ However, more positively, overall, ‘growth in energy-related carbon dioxide emissions continues to decouple from global economic growth. Emissions growth slowed to 0.8% in 2024, while the global economy expanded by more than 3%’.
That may be good news, but IEA’s executive director Fatih Birol said: ‘Electricity use is growing rapidly, pulling overall energy demand along with it to such an extent that it is enough to reverse years of declining energy consumption in advanced economies. The result is that demand for all major fuels and energy technologies increased in 2024, with renewables covering the largest share of the growth, followed by natural gas.’
The IEA has in the past been somewhat pessimistic about renewables and over-optimistic about nuclear, as Dr David Toke has noted: it got renewable estimates wrong, especially for solar PV. And he says it did not pay enough attention to energy efficiency. But of late it’s been taking climate change much more seriously, so it now gives much more attention to the green options, although it includes some nuclear in that. And also Carbon Capture and Storage, which some see as expensive, much more so than renewables, and at best just helping us to keep using fossil fuel for a bit longer- while also sometimes dubiously trading in emissions.
However, as the IEA recognises, something has to change. We are up against continued and indeed, in some cases, expanded use of coal, some of which is wiping out the emission reduction gains. Expanding the now relatively low-cost renewables very much faster, for heat as well as power, will help, so would massive commitment to energy saving and energy efficiency, often the cheapest energy option. Nuclear, arguably, we can do without- it’s risky, expensive and not expandable rapidly on the scale needed: renewables are expand far faster and have a huge potential globally. But that is not enough: we also have to tackle energy and material use and expanding demand. Growth can’t continue for ever, however clean, green or efficient we make the use of resources, including materials - there are still planetary limits.
*The International Renewable Energy Agency (IRENA) has also produced a new overview of the very rapid expansion of renewables during the last year, which also shows just how far ahead of the rest China has got. It says that in 2024 it was responsible for ‘almost 64% of the global added capacity’. Out of the total global renewable capacity at the end of 2024 of 4.5TW, including hydro, China had a total of 1.8TW, with Europe following far behind at 0.8 TW and the US well behind that at 0.4TW. In terms of solar, China leads at 0.9TW, Europe at around 0.3 TW and the US 0.15TW. And in terms of wind, China led again, at 0.52TW, with Europe at 0.27TW and the US at just 0.15TW.
Even so, it is all going the same way, to more and more renewables, with IRENA saying that ‘2024 marks yet another benchmark in renewable energy capacity and growth’. However, it also says that ‘progress still falls short of the 11.2 terawatts needed to align with the global goal to triple installed renewable energy capacity by 2030. To reach this goal, renewable capacity must now expand by 16.6 % annually until 2030’.
So it’s a mix of good and bad news: IRENA Director-General, Francesco La Camera said: ‘The continuous growth of renewables we witness each year is evidence that renewables are economically viable and readily deployable. Each year they keep breaking their own expansion records, but we also face the same challenges of great regional disparities and the ticking clock as the 2030 deadline is imminent’.
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