Renewable energy jumps to new high, powered by China solar boom

Wind turbines dot the coast line along a giant solar farm near Weifang in eastern China's Shandong province on March 22, 2024. (AP Photo/Ng Han Guan, File)

WASHINGTON — Installation of renewable energy worldwide hit a record high last year, with 92.5% of all new electricity brought online coming from the sun, wind or other clean sources, an international agency reports.

Nearly 64% of the new renewable electricity generated in 2024 was in China, according to Wednesday’s report by the International Renewable Energy Agency (IRENA). Overall, the world added 585 billion watts of new renewable electrical energy, a 15.1% jump from 2023, with 46% of the world’s electricity coming from solar, wind and other green non-nuclear energy sources.

But even that big jump does not put the globe on track to reach the international goal of tripling renewable energy from 2023 to 2030, with the world on pace to be 28% short, IRENA calculated. The goal was adopted in 2023 as part of the world’s efforts to curb the increasing impacts of climate change and transition away from fossil fuels such as coal, oil and natural gas.

“Renewable energy is powering down the fossil fuel age. Record-breaking growth is creating jobs, lowering energy bills and cleaning our air,” United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres said in a statement. “But the shift to clean energy must be faster and fairer.”

China added almost 374 billion watts of renewable power — three quarters of it from solar panels — in 2024. That’s more than eight times as much as the United States did and five times what Europe added last year.

China now has nearly 887 billion watts of solar panel power, compared to 176 billion in the United States, nearly 90 billion watts in Germany, 21 billion watts in France and more than 17 billion watts in the United Kingdom.

United Nations climate chief Simon Stiell used the figures Wednesday to challenge Europe and other industrialized nations to catch up with China.

“As one government steps back from climate leadership, it opens up space for others to step forward and seize the vast benefits,” Stiell told European leaders in Berlin, making reference to U.S. President Trump’s withdrawal from the Paris climate agreement. “The clean energy transition can be Europe’s economic engine-room now — when new sources of growth are vital to buttress living standards and for decades to come.”

Stiell said the IRENA numbers show that the “global renewables boom is unstoppable” and said the market for green energy reached US$2 trillion last year.

The move to renewables can grow even faster, said Neil Grant, senior policy analyst at Climate Analytics, which tracks and projects countries’ climate change fighting efforts.

“If in 2024 renewables grew 15%, think how much faster they could grow with the full backing of comprehensive, credible and ambitious climate policies around the world,” said Grant, who wasn’t part of the IRENA report.

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Seth Borenstein, The Associated Press