The 2024 World Energy Outlook published today by the International Energy Agency (IEA) calls for decisive political action to limit the global rise in temperatures to 1.5°C. In the report, the IEA also emphasises the contribution that the energy transition is making to strengthening energy security. Although the agency believes that prices for fossil fuels are likely to fall in the coming years, it nevertheless thinks it is important to use this time to further accelerate the global energy transition.

Federal Minister for Economic Affairs and Climate Action, Robert Habeck, said: “According to the World Energy Outlook, the world is at a crossroads: we are seeing major progress in the energy transition worldwide. The electrification efforts are also continuing to pick up speed in all sectors. At the same time, there are still a lot of obstacles that are hampering the expansion of renewable sources of energy in many countries, and we need to make significantly greater efforts to increase energy efficiency in order to be able to completely replace fossil fuels. However, the current geopolitical situation and the high concentration of production capacities for renewable energy technologies and critical raw materials pose risks to our energy security and the climate-neutral transformation. This is why we in the EU also want to establish sufficient production sites of our own for renewable energy and transformation technologies.”

Based on the current global environment, the IEA concludes in its projection that renewable energy capacity will expand to almost 10,000 GW by 2030. This means that the target set at COP28 of tripling the installed renewable energy capacity will not be fully achieved. However, according to the IEA’s analyses, this rate of increase will be sufficient to meet the growth in global energy demand and lead to a decline in coal-fired power generation.

This level of development means that the energy transition will progress faster than ever before. In 2023 alone, global installed renewable energy capacity rose by 560 GW. Nevertheless, it must be borne in mind that the expansion in renewable generation capacity varies greatly by region and technology.

At the same time, the costs of most energy transition technologies are continuing to fall and investments in the energy transition are approaching an annual total of 2 trillion US dollars, almost double the expenditure for oil, gas and coal.
Based on these developments, the IEA concludes that the peak for the use of fossil fuels will be passed by 2030 and that a downward trend will begin.

Germany is making a significant contribution to these developments. In the first half of 2024, around 57% of the electricity generated in this country was provided by renewable energy sources, which is more than ever before. By 2030, at least 80 per cent of Germany’s gross electricity consumption is to be covered by renewable sources. At the same time, Germany recorded an all-time high in the level of newly built renewable energy installations in 2024: in the area of onshore wind energy, the 10 GW mark for the annual capacity to be installed by 2030 is within reach. In the case of PV, 10.2 GW of new capacity was already installed by the end of August.

Implementation of COP28 results must be rigorously pursued

The generation capacities required for achieving the global energy transition targets set by COP28, i.e. tripling renewable energy capacity by 2030, are in place. It is now crucial that this is also reflected in the electricity mix in the coming years. This requires further efforts to be made in expanding the grid and integrating renewable sources into the grid. Germany will also advocate this at the COP29 climate negotiations in Baku.

Furthermore, according to the IEA, increased investment in the energy transition in developing countries is crucial to ensure the goal of universal energy access and to meet the growing demand for energy through clean power. In addition, more attention must be paid to diversifying supply chains for key energy transition technologies. The IEA scenarios indicate that, particularly in the case of critical raw materials such as copper and lithium, the planned production capacity will not be sufficient to fully cover the planned demand.

The IEA will also present the 2024 WEO at a joint event of the Federal Ministry for Economic Affairs and Climate Action, the BDI (Federation of German Industries) and the World Energy Council Germany. The event will be held in Berlin on 5 November 2024.