Renewables stepped up to meet surge in energy demand from rising temperatures in 2024, IEA says
Regardless of some climate-related setbacks, the decoupling of emissions from financial development is one promising development.
Report excessive temperatures contributed to a pointy enhance on the planet’s electrical energy use final 12 months, the Worldwide Vitality Company (IEA)’s newest report reveals.
Intense heatwaves boosted folks’s demand for cooling in lots of international locations, including to rising consumption from trade, the electrification of transport, and the expansion of knowledge centres and AI.
These power-hungry elements drove a 2.2 per cent rise in power demand final 12 months – decrease than GDP development of three.2 per cent, however nearly twice its current common of 1.3 per cent between 2013 and 2023.
“There are a lot of uncertainties on the planet right now and completely different narratives about power,” says IEA Govt Director Fatih Birol. “What is definite is that electrical energy use is rising quickly, pulling general power demand together with it to such an extent that it is sufficient to reverse years of declining power consumption in superior economies.”
“The result’s that demand for all main fuels and power applied sciences elevated in 2024, with renewables protecting the biggest share of the expansion, adopted by pure gasoline. And the sturdy growth of photo voltaic, wind, nuclear energy and EVs is more and more loosening the hyperlinks between financial development and emissions.”
How is local weather change growing emissions?
The suggestions loop between rising temperatures and emissions is one regarding development in IEA’s International Vitality Overview 2025.
Fierce heatwaves in China and India – which pushed up cooling wants – contributed greater than 90 per cent of the overall annual enhance in coal consumption globally.
Report temperatures world wide contributed considerably to the annual 0.8 per cent rise in world CO2 emissions to 37.8 billion tonnes.
However the deployment of photo voltaic and wind power, nuclear, electrical vehicles and warmth pumps since 2019 now prevents 2.6 billion tonnes of CO2 annually, in response to the IEA. That’s equal to 7 per cent of worldwide emissions.
Extra excellent news from the report contains how the increasing provide of low-emissions sources lined many of the enhance in world electrical energy demand in 2024. The quantity of recent renewable energy capability put in worldwide rose to round 700 gigawatts final 12 months.
What’s the power image in Europe?
Europe’s renewables revolution is continuous apace. Wind and photo voltaic reached a document share of 28 per cent of electrical energy manufacturing final 12 months, surpassing the mixed share from coal and gasoline for the primary time.
In whole, renewables accounted for nearly 50 per cent of electrical energy manufacturing. Following extreme droughts in 2023, above-average rainfall helped enhance hydropower technology.
However poor wind situations in Europe drove up fossil gas use within the energy sector.
Total, whereas power demand within the EU began to develop once more for the primary time since 2017 (other than the post-COVID rebound in 2021), its energy-related CO2 emissions decreased by 2.2 per cent.
“From slowing world oil demand development and rising deployment of electrical vehicles to the quickly increasing position of electrical energy and the growing decoupling of emissions from financial development, most of the key tendencies the IEA has recognized forward of the curve are displaying up clearly within the information for 2024,” provides Dr Birol.
