Huge growth in demand for electricity

18.10.2024

The International Energy Agency (IEA) has presented its World Energy Outlook 2024. It sent out contradictory signals in terms of a CO2-free energy supply.

By the end of this decade, more than half of the electricity produced on Earth will come from renewable energies - but the world is still "a long way" from achieving the goal of a CO2-neutral energy supply by 2050.

In its latest World Energy Outlook, the Paris-based International Energy Agency therefore calls for the expansion of renewables to be accelerated. It warns of ongoing risks to energy security - for example due to geopolitical tensions and climate change.

"We have lived through the coal age and the oil age and are now rapidly entering the electricity age," said IEA CEO Fatih Birol. This electricity will increasingly come from clean sources. In 2023, more clean energy generation plants will have been installed than ever before.

According to the World Energy Outlook, electricity generation capacity from renewables will increase from the current 4,250 gigawatts to almost 10,000 gigawatts in 2030. Although the goal of tripling this figure has not been achieved, this capacity is "more than sufficient" to cover the growing global demand for electricity and to push back energy production from coal, according to the IEA.

With the help of nuclear power, in which interest has revived in many countries, solar and battery technology, low-carbon energy sources are expected to generate more than half of the world's electricity by 2030.

Accordingly, global emissions of the greenhouse gas carbon dioxide will fall "before 2030". However, "without a sharp reduction thereafter, the world is on track to achieve a rise in global average temperatures of 2.4 degrees Celsius by the end of the century", warned the IEA. This is well above the ambitious Paris Climate Agreement target of plus 1.5 degrees.

According to the IEA, the demand for electricity is growing enormously. Industry, electromobility, data processing, air conditioning - a lot of electricity is needed everywhere. In the Global South in particular, this has led to a sharp increase in energy generation from fossil sources in the past year.

Two thirds of the increase in energy demand was covered by fossil fuels in 2023. As a result, CO2 emissions from energy production were higher than ever last year.

The IEA is calling for emerging countries in particular to be supplied with the technology to generate clean energy. This would lead to a significant reduction in global emissions, according to the report.

Download the "World Energy Outlook 2024"

Author: Claus-Detlef Grossmann