Guardian/Damian Carrington: 'Spectacular' drop in renewable energy costs leads to record global boost

Renewable energy

'Spectacular' drop in renewable energy costs leads to record global boost

Falling solar and wind prices have led to new power deals across the world despite investment in renewables falling

Shares
1,077

Damian Carrington Environment editor

Tuesday 6 June 2017 23.30 BST
Last modified on Tuesday 6 June 2017 23.32 BST

Renewable energy capacity around the world was boosted by a record amount in 2016 and delivered at a markedly lower cost, according to new global data – although the total financial investment in renewables actually fell.

The greater “bang-for-buck” resulted from plummeting prices for solar and wind power and led to new power deals in countries including Denmark, Egypt, India, Mexico and the United Arab Emirates all being priced well below fossil fuel or nuclear options.

Analysts warned that the US’s withdrawal from the Paris climate change agreement, announced last week by Donald Trump, risked the US being left behind in the fast-moving transition to a low-carbon economy. But they also warned that the green transition was still not happening fast enough to avoid the worst impacts of global warming, especially in the transport and heating sectors.
The US is the biggest loser on the planet thanks to Trump’s calamitous act
Vicki Arroyo
Read more

The new renewable energy capacity installed worldwide in 2016 was 161GW, a 10% rise on 2015 and a new record, according to REN21, a network of public and private sector groups covering 155 nations and 96% of the world’s population.

The new record capacity cost $242bn, a 23% reduction in investment compared to 2015, and renewables investment remained larger than for all fossil fuels. Subsidies for green energy, however, are still much lower than those for coal, oil and gas.

New solar power provided the biggest boost – half of all new capacity – followed by wind power at a third and hydropower at 15%. It is the first year that the new solar capacity added has been greater than any other electricity-producing technology.

“A global energy transition [is] well under way, with record new additions of installed renewable energy capacity, rapidly falling costs and the decoupling of economic growth and energy-related carbon dioxide emissions for the third year running,” said Arthouros Zervos, chair of REN21.
Solar panels are sold alongside food in a market in Burkina Faso.
Facebook
Twitter
Pinterest
Solar panels are sold alongside food in a market in Burkina Faso. Photograph: Joerg Boethling/Alamy

“Trump’s withdrawal of the US from the Paris agreement is unfortunate,” said Christine Lins, executive secretary of REN21. “But the renewables train has already left the station and those who ignore renewables’ central role in climate mitigation risk being left behind.”

Vivien Foster, global lead for energy economics at the World Bank, said: “Over 2016 there has been a dramatic and sustained improvement in the competitiveness of renewable power generation technologies. The most spectacular renewable energy prices were revealed through auctions that are gaining in popularity in many countries.”

Renewable energy capacity in 2016 rose 17% to 921GW, excluding hydropower, and rose 8.7% to 2,017GW when including hydropower.

At the end of 2016, more than 24% of global electricity was produced by renewables, dominated by hydropower and with wind contributing 4.0% and solar 1.5%. For all energy, renewable energy – excluding traditional wood-burning – contributed 10%, overshadowed by the 80% coming from fossil fuels such as oil and gas.
Analysis The Paris deal pullout is more damaging to the US than the climate
Damian Carrington: The US abandoning the global climate deal brings risks, but the unity of the rest of the world and plummeting green energy costs are reasons for hope
Read more

Lins said the switch to green energy needed to speed up and, crucially, start converting transport, heating and cooling to renewable sources. “The world is in a race against time,” she said.

Christiana Figueres, the former UN climate chief who delivered the Paris agreement and is now convenor of Mission 2020, said: “The economic case for renewables as the backbone of our global energy system is increasingly clear and proven. Offering ever greater bang-for-buck, renewables are quite simply the cheapest way to generate energy in an ever-growing number of countries.”

But to start bringing global carbon emissions down, she said, “the uptake of renewables needs to happen faster across all nations. This is a race to the top and the cost of being left behind is significant. As the US waivers on its commitment to climate action, those who turn their back on renewables risk being left behind.”
Hello again …

… today we have a small favour to ask. More people are reading the Guardian than ever but advertising revenues across the media are falling fast. And unlike many news organisations, we haven’t put up a paywall – we want to keep our journalism as open as we can. So we think it’s fair to ask people who visit us often for their help. The Guardian’s independent, investigative journalism takes a lot of time, money and hard work to produce. But we do it because we believe our perspective matters – because it might well be your perspective, too.

    Because I appreciate there not being a paywall: it is more democratic for the media to be available for all and not a commodity to be purchased by a few. I’m happy to make a contribution so others with less means still have access to information.
    Thomasine F-R.

If everyone who reads our reporting, who likes it, helps to support it, our future would be much more secure.
Become a supporter
Make a contribution
Topics

    Renewable energy

    Wind power
    Solar power
    Paris climate agreement
    Energy
    Climate change
    news

    Share on LinkedIn
    Share on Pinterest
    Share on Google+



    In Brief This Week: Thermo Fisher, DiaSorin, VolitionRx, and BioAffinity 360dx.com

About this Content
most viewed
The Guardian

    home
    UK
    world
    sport
    football
    opinion
    culture
    business
    lifestyle
    fashion
    tech
    travel

all

    Environment
    › Renewable energy

    become a supporter
    make a contribution
    securedrop
    solve technical issue

    advertise with us
    work for us
    contact us
    complaints & corrections

    terms & conditions
    privacy policy
    cookie policy
    digital newspaper archive

    all topics
    all contributors
    Facebook
    Twitter

© 2017 Guardian News and Media Limited or its affiliated companies. All rights reserved.