Renewable Energy Investment Tops $100 billion
Renewable energy is all the rage these days, but how big of an impact is it having? That’s one of the questions the Renewable Energy Policy Network for the 21st Century sought to address in a recent report, Renewables 2007: Global Status Report.
The report is based on a document that came out of the 2004 global conference in Bonn, Germany. The goal of the report is to give a “an integrated perspective on the global renewable energy situation.” Granted that it comes from an advocacy organization, the report provides a useful compendium of the current status.
Framing the growing momentum for change, the report notes that “More than 65 countries now have goals for their own renewable energy futures.” Furthermore, “in 2007, more than $100 billion was invested in renewable energy production assets, manufacturing, research, and development—a true global milestone.” Starting from this perspective, the authors argue that the perception of what is being done about global warming “lag behind the reality of renewable energy because change has been so rapid in recent years.”
For example:
- Renewable electricity generation capacity reached an estimated 240 gigawatts (GW) worldwide in 2007, an increase of 50 percent over 2004. Renewables represent 5 percent of global power capacity and 3.4 percent of global power generation.
- Renewable energy generated as much electric power worldwide in 2006 as one-quarter of the world’s nuclear power plants, not counting large hydropower. (And more than nuclear counting large hydropower.)
- The largest component of renewables generation capacity is wind power, which grew by 28 percent worldwide in 2007 to reach an estimated 95 GW. Annual capacity additions increased even more: 40 percent higher in 2007 compared to 2006.
- The fastest growing energy technology in the world is grid-connected solar photovoltaics (PV), with 50 percent annual increases in cumulative installed capacity in both 2006 and 2007, to an estimated 7.7 GW. This translates into 1.5 million homes with rooftop solar PV feeding into the grid worldwide.
- Rooftop solar heat collectors provide hot water to nearly 50 million households worldwide, and space heating to a growing number of homes. Existing solar hot water/heating capacity increased by 19 percent in 2006 to reach 105 gigawatts-thermal (GWth) globally.
- Biomass and geothermal energy are commonly employed for both power and heating, with recent increases in a number of countries, including uses for district heating. More than 2 million groundsource heat pumps are used in 30 countries for building heating and cooling.
- Production of biofuels (ethanol and biodiesel) exceeded an estimated 53 billion liters in 2007, up 43 percent from 2005. Ethanol production in 2007 represented about 4 percent of the 1,300 billion liters of gasoline consumed globally. Annual biodiesel production increased by more than 50 percent in 2006.
- Developing countries as a group have more than 40 percent of existing renewable power capacity, more than 70 percent of existing solar hot water capacity, and 45 percent of biofuels production.
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