With solar and wind power already the\u00a0cheapest source of new power generation\u00a0across two-thirds of the globe, analysts at Bloomberg New Energy Finance (BNEF) have predicted\u00a0Europe will lead the race to decarbonize\u00a0its grid.<\/p>\n
The authors of this year\u2019s\u00a0New Energy Outlook<\/em>\u00a0report, published today, expect Europe to generate 92% of its electricity from renewables by 2050 thanks to\u00a0carbon pricing\u00a0and other supportive policies. The U.K. last week voiced a\u00a0net zero carbon 2050 ambition\u00a0and it is expected Ireland and the EU will follow suit in due course.<\/p>\n Power sector emissions in China, however, are not set to peak until 2026 \u2013 thanks to an\u00a0extensive modern coal power fleet\u00a0\u2013 although they are expected to decline by more than half in the subsequent 20 years. That is in part because of an anticipated rise in demand for electricity of more than 50% by 2050, with Asia due to present a $5.8 trillion power demand market \u2013 more than half the global figure during that period \u2013 and India and China alone a $4.3 trillion opportunity.<\/p>\n The U.S. will also lag behind Europe when it comes to decarbonization, according to the annual study, which is based on analysis of the costs of competing energy technologies.\u00a0Renewables will more than double their contribution to the U.S. energy mix, to 43% in 2050, but will have to complete with abundant natural gas in a $1.1 trillion new energy capacity market.<\/p>\n Renewables are the big winner<\/strong><\/p>\n Despite the prevalence of natural gas in the U.S., the\u00a0New Energy Outlook 2019<\/em>\u00a0study predicts that as an energy source, gas will occupy roughly the same share of the market in 2050 as it does today, as will hydropower and\u00a0nuclear. Oil will have disappeared as a source of energy by mid century, added the BNEF report, and coal \u2013 which supplies 37% of power generation today \u2013 will have been reduced to a 12% slice of the pie.<\/p>\n Renewables, helped by\u00a0lithium-ion battery storage\u00a0will fill the void, according to BNEF, with a rise from 7% of power generation today to 48% by 2050.<\/p>\n That is down to an estimation\u00a0price reductions in solar,\u00a0energy storage\u00a0and wind technologies will continue at rates of 28%, 18% and 14%, respectively, for every doubling in installed capacity. If those predictions are borne out, renewables will supply and store more energy than coal and gas \u201calmost everywhere\u201d by 2030, stated the report.<\/p>\n The good news is that would ensure the world stays on track for global heating of less than two degrees Celsius by 2050 up to the year 2030, without the need for any new public money incentives for renewables in the next 15 years. Beyond that point, however, new technologies would be required as renewables could top out at contributing 80% of energy generation in many countries by 2050.<\/p>\n New solutions needed<\/strong><\/p>\n That would mean innovations and alternative solutions such as nuclear, biogas-to-power,\u00a0green hydrogen-to-power\u00a0and carbon capture and storage would need to be rolled out after 2030, which in turn would require significant spending on R&D before that point.<\/p>\n One other requirement needed to keep us on track as far as 2030 would be for power markets to be reformed to correctly acknowledge, and reward, the role played by renewables and storage in helping the grid.<\/p>\n In a press release issued to publicize today\u2019s BNEF report \u2013 which also considers the potential carbon savings to be made in a world with fully electrified transport and building heating \u2013 the organization\u2019s head of energy economics Elena Giannakopoulou stated: \u201c[The] NEO [New Energy Outlook<\/em>] is fundamentally policy agnostic but it does assume that markets operate rationally and fairly to allow lowest cost providers to win.\u201d<\/p>\n Therein lies the rub, perhaps.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" With solar and wind power already the\u00a0cheapest source of new power generation\u00a0across two-thirds of the globe, analysts at Bloomberg New Energy Finance (BNEF) have predicted\u00a0Europe will lead the race to decarbonize\u00a0its grid….<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":3509,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[46,48,57,68,76,77,82,87,90,96,99,107,109,111,113,137,139,146,148,160,174,183,184,201,202,209,222,230,232,233,244,246,249,256,262,263,267,277,279,288],"class_list":["post-3476","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-clean-energy","tag-aramco","tag-athens","tag-baroudi","tag-carbon","tag-climate","tag-climate-change","tag-co2","tag-decarbonising","tag-democracy","tag-doha","tag-eastmed","tag-embargo","tag-emissions","tag-energy","tag-energy-peace","tag-gas","tag-gazprom","tag-greece","tag-greenenergy","tag-international-maritime-disputes","tag-lebanon","tag-maritime-boundaries-east-mediterranean","tag-maritime-disputes","tag-offshore","tag-oil","tag-opec","tag-pollution","tag-poverty-alleviation","tag-putin","tag-qatar","tag-rosneft","tag-roudi","tag-russia","tag-saudi","tag-solar","tag-solar-power","tag-straddling-hydrocarbons-reserves","tag-total","tag-trump","tag-usa"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/emimer.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3476","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/emimer.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/emimer.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/emimer.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/emimer.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=3476"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/emimer.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3476\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/emimer.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/3509"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/emimer.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=3476"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/emimer.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=3476"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/emimer.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=3476"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}