Record year for renewables in 2014 driven by supportive policy: report

2014 might have been a tough year for renewables in Australia, but the latest Global Status report by REN21 (the Renewable Energy Policy Network) paints a picture of a record breaking year, where a growing number of national and state renewable energy policies drove the addition of around 135GW of new renewables capacity for the year, resulting in an end-of year total installed capacity of 1,712GW – up 8.5 per cent on the year before.

The report also stressed what an IEA report from earlier this year had already told us, that 2014 marked the first year where the rise in global greenhouse gas emissions stopped, even as economic growth continued.

The report credited the “landmark ‘decoupling’ of economic and CO2 growth” in large measure to China’s increased use of renewable resources, and efforts by countries in the OECD – but not Australia – to promote more sustainable growth, including increased use of energy efficiency and renewable energy.

It says that with supportive policies now in place in at least 145 countries (up from 138 countries reported last year), worldwide power generation capacity from wind, solar PV and hydro sources alone were up 128GW from 2013.

As of end-2014, the report says, renewables comprised an estimated 27.7 per cent of the world’s power generating capacity, enough to supply an estimated 22.8 per cent of global electricity demand.

Solar PV is again a hero, adding 40GW for the year – it’s also the only area in which Australia is competitive, cracking the Top 10 for added PV capacity for the year. According to the report, PV has grown at “the most phenomenal rate” among the renewables — up 48-fold from 2004 (3.7GW) to 2014 (177GW).

Wind power added the most capacity for the year – 50GW in 2014. Growth in this sector was up nearly eight-fold over the 2004-2014 period, from a total of 48GW in 2004 to 370GW in 2014, according to the report.

Global investment in renewable power and fuels (not including big hydro) was also up for the year, increasing 17 per cent on 2013, to $US270.2 billion.

Including large-scale hydropower, new investment in renewable power and fuels reach at least $US301 billion.

Global new investment in renewable power capacity was more than twice that of investment in net fossil fuel power capacity, continuing the trend of renewables outpacing fossil fuels in net investment for the fifth year running.

Investment in developing countries was up 36 per cent from the previous year to $US131.3 billion, bringing it the closest ever to surpassing the investment total for developed economies, which reached $US138.9 billion in 2014, up only 3 per cent from 2013.

China accounted for 63 per cent of developing country investment, while Chile, Indonesia, Kenya, Mexico, South Africa and Turkey each invested more than $US1 billion.

By dollars spent, the leading countries for investment were China, the US, Japan, the UK and Germany. Leading countries for investments relative to per capita GDP were Burundi, Kenya, Honduras, Jordan, and Uruguay.

The sector’s growth could be even greater if the more than $US550 billion in annual subsidies for fossil fuel and nuclear energy were removed, the report said.