Emissions from global electricity generation may have now peaked

Global emissions from electricity generation may have peaked in 2022 and are expected to start declining over the next few years. This indicates that the power sector may have reached a tipping point in its transition to clean power.

Electricity emissions increased by 1.3% last year, a record high. This is due to a slight increase in coal use to meet increased electricity demand after the end of covid-19 lockdowns.

But 2022 will likely be the last year the global power sector will record such an increase in emissions, says energy think tank Ember.

In the new report, which uses 2022 data from 78 countries covering 93% of the world’s electricity demand, Ember finds that last year’s record-breaking renewable energy deployment helped wind and solar power 10% to 12% of the total. 2021 years.

Cheap green power met 80% of the increase in electricity demand as the economy opened up after the covid-19 lockdowns, while coal power grew by just 1.1% in 2022.

According to Ember’s report, the pace of clean power growth will accelerate in 2023 and beyond as developers take advantage of falling technology costs and favorable government policies to deploy cheaper green power generation.

A large increase in renewable energy deployment, coupled with a slight decline in fossil fuel power generation, is expected to be enough to keep power sector emissions flat or even down next year.

“This decisive decade for climate marks the beginning of the end of the fossil age,” lead author Małgorzata Wiatros-Motyka said at a press conference. “We are entering an era of clean power.”

Alfonso Martinez-Felipe of the University of Aberdeen, UK, says Ember’s predictions are “workable”.

But James Glynne of Columbia University in New York says it will take another year or two to see any long-term downward trend in emissions. “It’s possible that 2022 was the peak year for global power sector emissions, but we won’t know until 2024 or 2025,” he says.

The global power sector is one of the world’s first to decarbonise, to put the world on track towards net zero emissions by mid-century, a path in line with limiting global warming to 1.5°C. Must be one.

According to the International Energy Agency (IEA), the electricity sector must be net zero globally by 2040 to keep up with this timeline.

However, despite Ember’s prediction that emissions in the power sector may already have peaked, there are still questions about whether emissions will decline rapidly enough to meet the IEA deadline.

Impax Asset Management’s Charlie Donovan says most people in the energy sector agree that emissions in the power sector have peaked or will soon peak. This is because commercial and political forces now support a global transition to low-carbon electricity.

“Everybody predicts emissions from the power sector will peak,” he says. “Long-term, there are structural factors. The fundamentals are in place.”

But he warns that the recent crash in fossil fuel prices may increase the use of coal and gas for power generation in the short term. This could mean that emissions will plateau over this decade rather than start to decline. “I think it could stay in the plateau much longer than some long-term fundamental factors suggest,” he says.