In 2025, renewable energy will be the main source of electricity in the world

Renewables will meet growth in electricity demand by 2025, surpassing coal.The latest Electricity market report from IEA says so

Renewables will cover almost all the growth in energy demand in the near future, in 2025 as announced by the International Energy Agency (IEA) in its Electricity market report 2023, thus becoming the most used supply source in the energy sector.

This means that in just three years, renewable sources will become the most requested energy source, ahead of coal, gas and nuclear, and CO2 emissions from the energy sector will thus be able to stabilize (and in some parts of the world even decrease), despite the rapid increase in energy demand.

 

Electricity market report, how much energy demand will grow

The economic context is what we know:GDP growth projections have been revised downwards for almost all global economies due to the energy crisis. However, according to the Electricity market report, Global electricity demand growth will increase sharply in 2023.Another 2,500 terawatt hours of demand will be added by 2025, predominantly in Asia, with China accounting for a third of global electricity demand.

This translates, globally, into an increase of 9 percent compared to current values.Overall demand will thus reach 29,281 TWh:this is equivalent to adding a slice of demand equal to that of the entire European Union to the global electricity system, in just three years.

Renewables will cover 35% of global electricity production

"The renewable energy and nuclear energy will dominate growth of global electricity supply over the next three years, together meeting on average more than 90 percent of additional demand,” the IEA writes in its report.

But renewables will cover the vast majority of this total, with a growth of 2,450 TWh:this is equivalent to 98 percent of global demand.The growth of nuclear energy (+302 TWh), however, will be led by China and India, together with the restart of reactors in Japan and France.

What is certain is that renewable sources they will surpass coal within three years (while for the moment the demand for clean sources has already surpassed that of gas), reaching 35 percent of global electricity production (currently 29 percent).

Extreme weather events, enemies of renewables

Since the first source of clean energy production is thehydroelectric, drought may risk compromising the IEA's positive picture.Not just the excessive heat but the heat in general extreme weather events they represent the main antagonist of renewable energy sources (for that matter, also of fossil fuels).

This indicates, according to the agency, the need to make demand more flexible, increasing storage capacity:in this way it will be possible to overcome the intermittency of renewable sources and exploit energy when needed.

Not only that storage batteries of solar energy (which are growing at a rate of 90 percent every year) but also water reserves, biomass and geothermal plants:all these elements will be complementary to the energy produced by the sun and the wind.

Renewables will stabilize CO2 emissions

Thanks to the fact that renewables will satisfy the growth in demand for electricity, CO2 emissions will reach their “plateau”:in fact, detailed IEA figures suggest a marginal decline of CO2 emissions from the energy sector by 2025.In particular, the reductions in Europe and the Americas will offset the increases in Asia and the Pacific, where it is true that renewables are growing rapidly but where the consumption of gas (especially in the Middle East) and coal (in Asia ).

In short, a more conservative reading of the IEA data would suggest that, after reaching their historical peak in 2022, CO2 emissions from electricity production will remain at the same level until 2025. This means emissions will remain at their all-time high for the next few years, or slightly below, rather than declining rapidly.

But there is a case that demonstrates how reducing emissions with massive investments in renewables is a feasible reality.This is Europe:thanks to clean technologies, in fact, CO2 emissions in the Old Continent will decline by 10 percent per year until 2025.