IEA: Electricity 2024 - Executive summary
https://www.iea.org/reports/electricity-2024/executive-summaryExecutive summary
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Clean electricity supply is forecast to meet all of the world’s demand growth through 2026
Record-breaking electricity generation from low-emissions sources – which includes nuclear and renewables such as solar, wind and hydro – is set to cover all global demand growth over the next three years. Low-emissions sources, which will reduce the role of fossil fuels in producing electricity globally, are forecast to account for almost half of the world’s electricity generation by 2026, up from 39% in 2023. Over the next three years, low-emissions generation is set to rise at twice the annual growth rate between 2018 and 2023 – a consequential change, given that the power sector contributes the most to global carbon dioxide (CO₂ ) emissions today.
Renewables are set to provide more than one-third of total electricity generation globally by early 2025, overtaking coal. The share of renewables in electricity generation is forecast to rise from 30% in 2023 to 37% in 2026, with the growth largely supported by the expansion of ever cheaper solar PV. Through this period, renewables are set to more than offset demand growth in advanced economies such as the United States and the European Union, displacing fossil-fired supply. At the same time, in China, the rapid expansion of renewable energy sources is expected to meet all additional electricity demand, though the weather and the extent to which the country’s demand growth eases remain key sources of uncertainty for the outlook. The strong expansion in renewable power capacity must also be accompanied by accelerated investment in grids and system flexibility to ensure its smooth integration.
The rapid growth of renewables, supported by rising nuclear generation, is set to displace global coal-fired generation, which is forecast to fall by an average of 1.7% annually through 2026. This follows a 1.6% increase in coal-fired output in 2023 amid droughts in India and China that reduced hydropower output and increased coal-fired generation, more than offsetting strong declines in coal-fired generation in the United States and the European Union. The major factor that will determine the global outlook is evolving trends in China, where more than half of world’s coal-fired generation takes place. Coal-fired generation in China is currently on course to experience a slow structural decline, driven by the strong expansion of renewables and growing nuclear generation, as well as moderating economic growth. Despite the commissioning of new plants to boost the security of energy supply, the utilisation rate of Chinese coal-fired plants is expected to continue to fall as they are used more flexibly to complement renewables. Nevertheless, coal-fired generation in China will be influenced significantly by the pace of the economy’s rebalancing, hydropower trends, and bottlenecks in integrating renewables into the country’s power system.
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= new reply since forum marked as read
The table again with data on one side, soothsaying on the other:
IEA World Energy Outlook 2024
Table A.1a: World energy supply Page 296.
Let me explain something: There are three columns designating years that have already occurred. 2010, 2022, and 2023. They are something called "data." The four columns, designated 2030, 2035, 2040, and 2050 are soothsaying.
The bar graph you show - a little education might help one to understand how trivial this growth because of the units chosen on the abscissa, in TWh. 1 TWh is equal to 3.6 Petajoules. The macroscopic unit of energyis the Exajoule. A Petajoule is equal to 0.001 Exajoules.
Note that every so called "renewable energy" plant will require a redundant plant to back it up when it isn't working. That's missing from the picture,
The soothsaying graphic about 2025 demonstrates trivial numbers, nothing to write home about, far too little, far too late. As I mused elsewhere, wind construction and wind turbine failure seem to have reached secular equilibrium: Should the Phoenix Arise; the Bateman Equation and Wind Energy.
We live on a planet where energy consumption was, as of 2023, consumed 642 Exajoules.
I generally direct my reading at the behest of scientists, usually scientists whose work I've read, but often at verbal requests for professional reasons. I find reading the rambling nonsense of nonscientists, or poor scientists - I know some - and/or reading requested by credulous rubes to be uninteresting.
Technetium-tungsten alloys have interested me a long time, because of the low solubility of tungsten in liquid plutonium; reading about that, writing about that, discussing that with my son is, um, interesting and pleasant. Addressing the rambles of people reading university press releases and carrying on about how 8EJ solar +8EJ of wind is important on a planet consuming 642 Exajoules is tiresome, boring as hell actually. It took me about a half hour to write the post, including getting to the sexy parts. I enjoyed it immensely, far more than I might enjoy reading tenuous drivel. I am familiar with the contents of IEA WEO reports, as I've been working with them for over 20 years and I couldn't care less about what credulous rubes take away from them.
The results of having listened with a shaking head to more than two decades of drivel here about how fast so called "renewable energy" is growing, usually expressed in "percent talk" is here: The Disastrous 2024 CO2 Data Recorded at Mauna Loa: Yet Another Update 12/03/2024
Have a nice day. Three weeks to Christmas!