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UN chief Antonio Guterres says ‘the fossil fuel age is flailing and failing’ as renewable energy becomes cheaper.
The global switch to renewable energy has passed a “positive tipping point”, and solar and wind power will become even cheaper and more widespread, according to two reports.
Last year, 74 percent of the growth in electricity generated worldwide was from wind, solar and other green sources, according to a report compiled by multiple United Nations agencies called Seizing the Moment of Opportunity. It was published on Tuesday.
It found that 92.5 percent of all new electricity capacity added to the grid worldwide in 2024 came from renewables. Meanwhile, sales of electric vehicles were up from 500,000 in 2015 to more than 17 million in 2024.
The three cheapest electricity sources globally last year were onshore wind, solar panels and new hydropower, according to an energy cost report by the International Renewable Energy Agency (IRENA), an intergovernmental organisation. Solar power now is 41 percent cheaper and wind power is 53 percent cheaper globally than the lowest-cost fossil fuel, the reports said.
“The fossil fuel age is flailing and failing,” UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres said in a speech at the UN headquarters in New York City.
“We are in the dawn of a new energy era. An era where cheap, clean, abundant energy powers a world rich in economic opportunity.”
“Just follow the money,” Guterres said, quoting the reports, which showed last year there was $2 trillion in investment in green energy, which is about $800bn more than in fossil fuels.
Renewables are booming despite fossil fuels getting nearly nine times the government consumption subsidies as they do, Guterres and the reports said.
In 2023, global fossil fuel subsidies amounted to $620bn, compared with $70bn for renewables, the UN report said.
Still, the UN warned that the switch to renewable energy is not happening fast enough.
Despite the boom in renewables, fossil fuel production globally is still increasing instead of going down in response. UN officials said that’s because power demand is increasing overall, spurred by developing countries, artificial intelligence data centres and the need for cooling in an ever warmer world.
Guterres warned nations that are hanging on to fossil fuels that they were heading down a dangerous path that would make them poorer not richer.
“Countries that cling to fossil fuels are not protecting their economies. They [are] sabotaging them – driving up costs, undermining competitiveness, locking in stranded assets,” Guterres said.
The global renewables growth has been mostly in countries like China – where one-tenth of the economy is tied up in green energy – as well as countries such as India and Brazil.
Africa represented less than 2 percent of the new green energy capacity installed last year despite having great electrification needs, the reports said.
“The Global South must be empowered to generate its own electricity without adding to already unsustainable level of debts,” Bahamian climate scientist Adelle Thomas of the Natural Resources Defense Council, who did not work on the reports, told The Associated Press news agency.
Guterres called on major technology firms to power data centres completely with renewables by 2030.
“A typical AI data centre eats up as much electricity as 100,000 homes,” Guterres said. “By 2030, data centres could consume as much electricity as all of Japan does today.”
“The future is being built in the cloud,” the UN chief said.
“It must be powered by the sun, the wind and the promise of a better world.”
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