renewable energy article essay

Renewable Energy

Renewable energy comes from sources that will not be used up in our lifetimes, such as the sun and wind.

Earth Science, Experiential Learning, Engineering, Geology

Wind Turbines in a Sheep Pasture

Wind turbines use the power of wind to generate energy. This is just one source of renewable energy.

Photograph by Jesus Keller/ Shutterstock

The wind, the sun, and Earth are sources of  renewable energy . These energy sources naturally renew, or replenish themselves.

Wind, sunlight, and the planet have energy that transforms in ways we can see and feel. We can see and feel evidence of the transfer of energy from the sun to Earth in the sunlight shining on the ground and the warmth we feel when sunlight shines on our skin. We can see and feel evidence of the transfer of energy in wind’s ability to pull kites higher into the sky and shake the leaves on trees. We can see and feel evidence of the transfer of energy in the geothermal energy of steam vents and geysers .

People have created different ways to capture the energy from these renewable sources.

Solar Energy

Solar energy can be captured “actively” or “passively.”

Active solar energy uses special technology to capture the sun’s rays. The two main types of equipment are photovoltaic cells (also called PV cells or solar cells) and mirrors that focus sunlight in a specific spot. These active solar technologies use sunlight to generate electricity , which we use to power lights, heating systems, computers, and televisions.

Passive solar energy does not use any equipment. Instead, it gets energy from the way sunlight naturally changes throughout the day. For example, people can build houses so their windows face the path of the sun. This means the house will get more heat from the sun. It will take less energy from other sources to heat the house.

Other examples of passive solar technology are green roofs , cool roofs, and radiant barriers . Green roofs are completely covered with plants. Plants can get rid of pollutants in rainwater and air. They help make the local environment cleaner.

Cool roofs are painted white to better reflect sunlight. Radiant barriers are made of a reflective covering, such as aluminum. They both reflect the sun’s heat instead of absorbing it. All these types of roofs help lower the amount of energy needed to cool the building.

Advantages and Disadvantages There are many advantages to using solar energy. PV cells last for a long time, about 20 years.

However, there are reasons why solar power cannot be used as the only power source in a community. It can be expensive to install PV cells or build a building using passive solar technology.

Sunshine can also be hard to predict. It can be blocked by clouds, and the sun doesn’t shine at night. Different parts of Earth receive different amounts of sunlight based on location, the time of year, and the time of day.

Wind Energy

People have been harnessing the wind’s energy for a long, long time. Five-thousand years ago, ancient Egyptians made boats powered by the wind. In 200 B.C.E., people used windmills to grind grain in the Middle East and pump water in China.

Today, we capture the wind’s energy with wind turbines . A turbine is similar to a windmill; it has a very tall tower with two or three propeller-like blades at the top. These blades are turned by the wind. The blades turn a generator (located inside the tower), which creates electricity.

Groups of wind turbines are known as wind farms . Wind farms can be found near farmland, in narrow mountain passes, and even in the ocean, where there are steadier and stronger winds. Wind turbines anchored in the ocean are called “ offshore wind farms.”

Wind farms create electricity for nearby homes, schools, and other buildings.

Advantages and Disadvantages Wind energy can be very efficient . In places like the Midwest in the United States and along coasts, steady winds can provide cheap, reliable electricity.

Another great advantage of wind power is that it is a “clean” form of energy. Wind turbines do not burn fuel or emit any pollutants into the air.

Wind is not always a steady source of energy, however. Wind speed changes constantly, depending on the time of day, weather , and geographic location. Currently, it cannot be used to provide electricity for all our power needs.

Wind turbines can also be dangerous for bats and birds. These animals cannot always judge how fast the blades are moving and crash into them.

Geothermal Energy

Deep beneath the surface is Earth’s core . The center of Earth is extremely hot—thought to be over 6,000 °C (about 10,800 °F). The heat is constantly moving toward the surface.

We can see some of Earth’s heat when it bubbles to the surface. Geothermal energy can melt underground rocks into magma and cause the magma to bubble to the surface as lava . Geothermal energy can also heat underground sources of water and force it to spew out from the surface. This stream of water is called a geyser.

However, most of Earth’s heat stays underground and makes its way out very, very slowly.

We can access underground geothermal heat in different ways. One way of using geothermal energy is with “geothermal heat pumps.” A pipe of water loops between a building and holes dug deep underground. The water is warmed by the geothermal energy underground and brings the warmth aboveground to the building. Geothermal heat pumps can be used to heat houses, sidewalks, and even parking lots.

Another way to use geothermal energy is with steam. In some areas of the world, there is underground steam that naturally rises to the surface. The steam can be piped straight to a power plant. However, in other parts of the world, the ground is dry. Water must be injected underground to create steam. When the steam comes to the surface, it is used to turn a generator and create electricity.

In Iceland, there are large reservoirs of underground water. Almost 90 percent of people in Iceland use geothermal as an energy source to heat their homes and businesses.

Advantages and Disadvantages An advantage of geothermal energy is that it is clean. It does not require any fuel or emit any harmful pollutants into the air.

Geothermal energy is only avaiable in certain parts of the world. Another disadvantage of using geothermal energy is that in areas of the world where there is only dry heat underground, large quantities of freshwater are used to make steam. There may not be a lot of freshwater. People need water for drinking, cooking, and bathing.

Biomass Energy

Biomass is any material that comes from plants or microorganisms that were recently living. Plants create energy from the sun through photosynthesis . This energy is stored in the plants even after they die.

Trees, branches, scraps of bark, and recycled paper are common sources of biomass energy. Manure, garbage, and crops , such as corn, soy, and sugar cane, can also be used as biomass feedstocks .

We get energy from biomass by burning it. Wood chips, manure, and garbage are dried out and compressed into squares called “briquettes.” These briquettes are so dry that they do not absorb water. They can be stored and burned to create heat or generate electricity.

Biomass can also be converted into biofuel . Biofuels are mixed with regular gasoline and can be used to power cars and trucks. Biofuels release less harmful pollutants than pure gasoline.

Advantages and Disadvantages A major advantage of biomass is that it can be stored and then used when it is needed.

Growing crops for biofuels, however, requires large amounts of land and pesticides . Land could be used for food instead of biofuels. Some pesticides could pollute the air and water.

Biomass energy can also be a nonrenewable energy source. Biomass energy relies on biomass feedstocks—plants that are processed and burned to create electricity. Biomass feedstocks can include crops, such as corn or soy, as well as wood. If people do not replant biomass feedstocks as fast as they use them, biomass energy becomes a non-renewable energy source.

Hydroelectric Energy

Hydroelectric energy is made by flowing water. Most hydroelectric power plants are located on large dams , which control the flow of a river.

Dams block the river and create an artificial lake, or reservoir. A controlled amount of water is forced through tunnels in the dam. As water flows through the tunnels, it turns huge turbines and generates electricity.

Advantages and Disadvantages Hydroelectric energy is fairly inexpensive to harness. Dams do not need to be complex, and the resources to build them are not difficult to obtain. Rivers flow all over the world, so the energy source is available to millions of people.

Hydroelectric energy is also fairly reliable. Engineers control the flow of water through the dam, so the flow does not depend on the weather (the way solar and wind energies do).

However, hydroelectric power plants are damaging to the environment. When a river is dammed, it creates a large lake behind the dam. This lake (sometimes called a reservoir) drowns the original river habitat deep underwater. Sometimes, people build dams that can drown entire towns underwater. The people who live in the town or village must move to a new area.

Hydroelectric power plants don’t work for a very long time: Some can only supply power for 20 or 30 years. Silt , or dirt from a riverbed, builds up behind the dam and slows the flow of water.

Other Renewable Energy Sources

Scientists and engineers are constantly working to harness other renewable energy sources. Three of the most promising are tidal energy , wave energy , and algal (or algae) fuel.

Tidal energy harnesses the power of ocean tides to generate electricity. Some tidal energy projects use the moving tides to turn the blades of a turbine. Other projects use small dams to continually fill reservoirs at high tide and slowly release the water (and turn turbines) at low tide.

Wave energy harnesses waves from the ocean, lakes, or rivers. Some wave energy projects use the same equipment that tidal energy projects do—dams and standing turbines. Other wave energy projects float directly on waves. The water’s constant movement over and through these floating pieces of equipment turns turbines and creates electricity.

Algal fuel is a type of biomass energy that uses the unique chemicals in seaweed to create a clean and renewable biofuel. Algal fuel does not need the acres of cropland that other biofuel feedstocks do.

Renewable Nations

These nations (or groups of nations) produce the most energy using renewable resources. Many of them are also the leading producers of nonrenewable energy: China, European Union, United States, Brazil, and Canada

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June 21, 2024

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The Future of Sustainable Energy

26 June, 2021

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Building a sustainable energy future calls for leaps forward in both technology and policy leadership. State governments, major corporations and nations around the world have pledged to address the worsening climate crisis by transitioning to 100% renewable energy over the next few decades. Turning those statements of intention into a reality means undertaking unprecedented efforts and collaboration between disciplines ranging from environmental science to economics.

There are highly promising opportunities for green initiatives that could deliver a better future. However, making a lasting difference will require both new technology and experts who can help governments and organizations transition to more sustainable practices. These leaders will be needed to source renewables efficiently and create environmentally friendly policies, as well as educate consumers and policymakers. To maximize their impact, they must make decisions informed by the most advanced research in clean energy technology, economics, and finance.

Current Trends in Sustainability

The imperative to adopt renewable power solutions on a worldwide scale continues to grow even more urgent as the global average surface temperature hits historic highs and amplifies the danger from extreme weather events . In many regions, the average temperature has already increased by 1.5 degrees , and experts predict that additional warming could drive further heatwaves, droughts, severe hurricanes, wildfires, sea level rises, and even mass extinctions.

In addition, physicians warn that failure to respond to this dire situation could unleash novel diseases : Dr. Rexford Ahima and Dr. Arturo Casadevall of the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine contributed to an article in the Journal of Clinical Investigation that explained how climate change could affect the human body’s ability to regulate its own temperature while bringing about infectious microbes that adapt to the warmer conditions.

World leaders have accepted that greenhouse gas emissions are a serious problem that must be addressed. Since the Paris Agreement was first adopted in December 2015, 197 nations have signed on to its framework for combating climate change and preventing the global temperature increase from reaching 2 degrees Celsius over preindustrial levels.

Corporate giants made their own commitments to become carbon neutral by funding offsets to reduce greenhouse gases and gradually transitioning into using 100% renewable energy. Google declared its operations carbon neutral in 2017 and has promised that all data centers and campuses will be carbon-free by 2030. Facebook stated that it would eliminate its carbon footprint in 2020 and expand that commitment to all the organization’s suppliers within 10 years. Amazon ordered 100,000 electric delivery vehicles and has promised that its sprawling logistics operations will arrive at net-zero emissions by 2040.

Despite these promising developments, many experts say that nations and businesses are still not changing fast enough. While carbon neutrality pledges are a step in the right direction, they don’t mean that organizations have actually stopped using fossil fuels . And despite the intentions expressed by Paris Agreement signatories, total annual carbon dioxide emissions reached a record high of 33.5 gigatons in 2018, led by China, the U.S., and India.

“The problem is that what we need to achieve is so daunting and taxes our resources so much that we end up with a situation that’s much, much worse than if we had focused our efforts,” Ferraro said.

Recent Breakthroughs in Renewable Power

An environmentally sustainable infrastructure requires innovations in transportation, industry, and utilities. Fortunately, researchers in the private and public sectors are laying the groundwork for an energy transformation that could make the renewable energy of the future more widely accessible and efficient.

Some of the most promising areas that have seen major developments in recent years include:

Driving Electric Vehicles Forward

The technical capabilities of electric cars are taking great strides, and the popularity of these vehicles is also growing among consumers. At Tesla’s September 22, 2020 Battery Day event, Elon Musk announced the company’s plans for new batteries that can be manufactured at a lower cost while offering greater range and increased power output .

The electric car market has seen continuing expansion in Europe even during the COVID-19 pandemic, thanks in large part to generous government subsidies. Market experts once predicted that it would take until 2025 for electric car prices to reach parity with gasoline-powered vehicles. However, growing sales and new battery technology could greatly speed up that timetable .

Cost-Effective Storage For Renewable Power

One of the biggest hurdles in the way of embracing 100% renewable energy has been the need to adjust supply based on demand. Utilities providers need efficient, cost-effective ways of storing solar and wind power so that electricity is available regardless of weather conditions. Most electricity storage currently takes place in pumped-storage hydropower plants, but these facilities require multiple reservoirs at different elevations.

Pumped thermal electricity storage is an inexpensive solution to get around both the geographic limitations of hydropower and high costs of batteries. This approach, which is currently being tested , uses a pump to convert electricity into heat so it can be stored in a material like gravel, water, or molten salts and kept in an insulated tank. A heat engine converts the heat back into electricity as necessary to meet demand.

Unlocking the Potential of Microgrids

Microgrids are another area of research that could prove invaluable to the future of power. These systems can operate autonomously from a traditional electrical grid, delivering electricity to homes and business even when there’s an outage. By using this approach with power sources like solar, wind, or biomass, microgrids can make renewable energy transmission more efficient.

Researchers in public policy and engineering are exploring how microgrids could serve to bring clean electricity to remote, rural areas . One early effort in the Netherlands found that communities could become 90% energy self-sufficient , and solar-powered microgrids have now also been employed in Indian villages. This technology has enormous potential to change the way we access electricity, but lowering costs is an essential step to bring about wider adoption and encourage residents to use the power for purposes beyond basic lighting and cooling.

Advancing the Future of Sustainable Energy

There’s still monumental work to be done in developing the next generation of renewable energy solutions as well as the policy framework to eliminate greenhouse gases from our atmosphere. An analysis from the International Energy Agency found that the technologies currently on the market can only get the world halfway to the reductions needed for net-zero emissions by 2050.

To make it the rest of the way, researchers and policymakers must still explore possibilities such as:

• Devise and implement large-scale carbon capture systems that store and use carbon dioxide without polluting the atmosphere
• Establish low-carbon electricity as the primary power source for everyday applications like powering vehicles and heat in buildings
• Grow the use of bioenergy harnessed from plants and algae for electricity, heat, transportation, and manufacturing
• Implement zero-emission hydrogen fuel cells as a way to power transportation and utilities

However, even revolutionary technology will not do the job alone. Ambitious goals for renewable energy solutions and long-term cuts in emissions also demand enhanced international cooperation, especially among the biggest polluters. That’s why Jonas Nahm of the Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies has focused much of his research on China’s sustainable energy efforts. He has also argued that the international community should recognize China’s pivotal role in any long-term plans for fighting climate change.

As both the leading emitter of carbon dioxide and the No. 1 producer of wind and solar energy, China is uniquely positioned to determine the future of sustainability initiatives. According to Nahm, the key to making collaboration with China work is understanding the complexities of the Chinese political and economic dynamics. Because of conflicting interests on the national and local levels, the world’s most populous nation continues to power its industries with coal even while President Xi Jinping advocates for fully embracing green alternatives.

China’s fraught position demonstrates that economics and diplomacy could prove to be just as important as technical ingenuity in creating a better future. International cooperation must guide a wide-ranging economic transformation that involves countries and organizations increasing their capacity for producing and storing renewable energy.

It will take strategic thinking and massive investment to realize a vision of a world where utilities produce 100% renewable power while rows of fully electric cars travel on smart highways. To meet the challenge of our generation, it’s more crucial than ever to develop leaders who understand how to apply the latest research to inform policy and who can take charge of globe-spanning sustainable energy initiatives .

About the MA in Sustainable Energy (online) Program at Johns Hopkins SAIS

Created by Johns Hopkins University School of Advanced International Studies faculty with input from industry experts and employers, the Master of Arts in Sustainable Energy (online) program is tailored for the demands of a rapidly evolving sector. As a top-11 global university, Johns Hopkins is uniquely positioned to equip graduates with the skills they need to confront global challenges in the transition to renewable energy.

The MA in Sustainable Energy curriculum is designed to build expertise in finance, economics, and policy. Courses from our faculty of highly experienced researchers and practitioners prepare graduates to excel in professional environments including government agencies, utility companies, energy trade organizations, global energy governance organizations, and more. Students in the Johns Hopkins SAIS benefit from industry connections, an engaged network of more than 230,000 alumni, and high-touch career services.

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renewable energy , usable energy derived from replenishable sources such as the Sun ( solar energy ), wind ( wind power ), rivers ( hydroelectric power ), hot springs ( geothermal energy ), tides ( tidal power ), and biomass ( biofuels ).

At the beginning of the 21st century, about 80 percent of the world’s energy supply was derived from fossil fuels such as coal , petroleum , and natural gas . Fossil fuels are finite resources; most estimates suggest that the proven reserves of oil are large enough to meet global demand at least until the middle of the 21st century. Fossil fuel combustion has a number of negative environmental consequences. Fossil-fueled power plants emit air pollutants such as sulfur dioxide , particulate matter , nitrogen oxides, and toxic chemicals (heavy metals: mercury , chromium , and arsenic ), and mobile sources, such as fossil-fueled vehicles, emit nitrogen oxides, carbon monoxide , and particulate matter. Exposure to these pollutants can cause heart disease , asthma , and other human health problems. In addition, emissions from fossil fuel combustion are responsible for acid rain , which has led to the acidification of many lakes and consequent damage to aquatic life, leaf damage in many forests, and the production of smog in or near many urban areas. Furthermore, the burning of fossil fuels releases carbon dioxide (CO 2 ), one of the main greenhouse gases that cause global warming .

In contrast, renewable energy sources accounted for nearly 20 percent of global energy consumption at the beginning of the 21st century, largely from traditional uses of biomass such as wood for heating and cooking . By 2015 about 16 percent of the world’s total electricity came from large hydroelectric power plants, whereas other types of renewable energy (such as solar, wind, and geothermal) accounted for 6 percent of total electricity generation. Some energy analysts consider nuclear power to be a form of renewable energy because of its low carbon emissions; nuclear power generated 10.6 percent of the world’s electricity in 2015.

Growth in wind power exceeded 20 percent and photovoltaics grew at 30 percent annually in the 1990s, and renewable energy technologies continued to expand throughout the early 21st century. Between 2001 and 2017 world total installed wind power capacity increased by a factor of 22, growing from 23,900 to 539,581 megawatts. Photovoltaic capacity also expanded, increasing by 50 percent in 2016 alone. The European Union (EU), which produced an estimated 6.38 percent of its energy from renewable sources in 2005, adopted a goal in 2007 to raise that figure to 20 percent by 2020. By 2016 some 17 percent of the EU’s energy came from renewable sources. The goal also included plans to cut emissions of carbon dioxide by 20 percent and to ensure that 10 percent of all fuel consumption comes from biofuels . The EU was well on its way to achieving those targets by 2017. Between 1990 and 2016 the countries of the EU reduced carbon emissions by 23 percent and increased biofuel production to 5.5 percent of all fuels consumed in the region. In the United States numerous states have responded to concerns over climate change and reliance on imported fossil fuels by setting goals to increase renewable energy over time. For example, California required its major utility companies to produce 20 percent of their electricity from renewable sources by 2010, and by the end of that year California utilities were within 1 percent of the goal. In 2008 California increased this requirement to 33 percent by 2020, and in 2017 the state further increased its renewable-use target to 50 percent by 2030.

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In a World on Fire, Stop Burning Things

On the last day of February, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change issued its most dire report yet. The Secretary-General of the United Nations, António Guterres, had, he said, “seen many scientific reports in my time, but nothing like this.” Setting aside diplomatic language, he described the document as “an atlas of human suffering and a damning indictment of failed climate leadership,” and added that “the world’s biggest polluters are guilty of arson of our only home.” Then, just a few hours later, at the opening of a rare emergency special session of the U.N. General Assembly, he catalogued the horrors of Vladimir Putin’s invasion of Ukraine , and declared, “Enough is enough.” Citing Putin’s declaration of a nuclear alert , the war could, Guterres said, turn into an atomic conflict, “with potentially disastrous implications for us all.”

What unites these two crises is combustion. Burning fossil fuel has driven the temperature of the planet ever higher, melting most of the sea ice in the summer Arctic, bending the jet stream , and slowing the Gulf Stream. And selling fossil fuel has given Putin both the money to equip an army (oil and gas account for sixty per cent of Russia’s export earnings) and the power to intimidate Europe by threatening to turn off its supply. Fossil fuel has been the dominant factor on the planet for centuries, and so far nothing has been able to profoundly alter that. After Putin invaded, the American Petroleum Institute insisted that our best way out of the predicament was to pump more oil. The climate talks in Glasgow last fall, which John Kerry, the U.S. envoy, had called the “last best hope” for the Earth, provided mostly vague promises about going “net-zero by 2050”; it was a festival of obscurantism, euphemism, and greenwashing, which the young climate activist Greta Thunberg summed up as “blah, blah, blah.” Even people trying to pay attention can’t really keep track of what should be the most compelling battle in human history.

So let’s reframe the fight. Along with discussing carbon fees and green-energy tax credits, amid the momentary focus on disabling Russian banks and flattening the ruble, there’s a basic, underlying reality: the era of large-scale combustion has to come to a rapid close. If we understand that as the goal, we might be able to keep score, and be able to finally get somewhere. Last Tuesday, President Biden banned the importation of Russian oil. This year, we may need to compensate for that with American hydrocarbons, but, as a senior Administration official put it ,“the only way to eliminate Putin’s and every other producing country’s ability to use oil as an economic weapon is to reduce our dependency on oil.” As we are one of the largest oil-and-gas producers in the world, that is a remarkable statement. It’s a call for an end of fire.

We don’t know when or where humans started building fires; as with all things primordial there are disputes. But there is no question of the moment’s significance. Fire let us cook food, and cooked food delivers far more energy than raw; our brains grew even as our guts, with less processing work to do, shrank. Fire kept us warm, and human enterprise expanded to regions that were otherwise too cold. And, as we gathered around fires, we bonded in ways that set us on the path to forming societies. No wonder Darwin wrote that fire was “the greatest discovery ever made by man, excepting language.”

Darwin was writing in the years following the Industrial Revolution, as we learned how to turn coal into steam power, gas into light, and oil into locomotion, all by way of combustion. Our species depends on combustion; it made us human, and then it made us modern. But, having spent millennia learning to harness fire, and three centuries using it to fashion the world we know, we must spend the next years systematically eradicating it. Because, taken together, those blazes—the fires beneath the hoods of 1.4 billion vehicles and in the homes of billions more people, in giant power plants, and in the boilers of factories and the engines of airplanes ships—are more destructive than the most powerful volcanoes, dwarfing Krakatoa and Tambora. The smoke and smog from those engines and appliances directly kill nine million people a year, more deaths than those caused by war and terrorism, not to mention malaria and tuberculosis, together. (In 2020, fossil-fuel pollution killed three times as many people as COVID -19 did.) Those flames, of course, also spew invisible and odorless carbon dioxide at an unprecedented rate; that CO 2 is already rearranging the planet’s climate, threatening not only those of us who live on it now but all those who will come after us.

But here’s the good news, which makes this exercise more than merely rhetorical: rapid advances in clean-energy technology mean that all that destruction is no longer necessary. In the place of those fires we keep lit day and night, it’s possible for us to rely on the fact that there is a fire in the sky—a great ball of burning gas about ninety-three million miles away, whose energy can be collected in photovoltaic panels, and which differentially heats the Earth, driving winds whose energy can now be harnessed with great efficiency by turbines. The electricity they produce can warm and cool our homes, cook our food, and power our cars and bikes and buses. The sun burns, so we don’t need to.

Wind and solar power are not a replacement for everything, at least not yet. Three billion people still cook over fire daily, and will at least until sufficient electricity reaches them, and perhaps thereafter, since culture shifts slowly. Even then, flames will still burn—for birthday-cake candles, for barbecues, for joints (until you’ve figured out the dosing for edibles)—just as we still use bronze, though its age has long passed. And there are a few larger industries—intercontinental air travel, certain kinds of metallurgy such as steel production—that may require combustion, probably of hydrogen, for some time longer. But these are relatively small parts of the energy picture. And in time they, too, will likely be replaced by renewable electricity. (Electric-arc furnaces are already producing some kinds of steel, and Japanese researchers have just announced a battery so light that it might someday power passenger flights across oceans.) In fact, I can see only one sublime, long-term use for large-scale planned combustion, which I will get to. Mostly, our job as a species is clear: stop smoking.

As of 2022, this task is both possible and affordable. We have the technology necessary to move fast, and deploying it will save us money. Those are the first key ideas to internalize. They are new and counterintuitive, but a few people have been working to realize them for years, and their stories make clear the power of this moment.

When Mark Jacobson was growing up in northern California in the nineteen-seventies, he showed a gift for science, and also for tennis. He travelled for tournaments to Los Angeles and San Diego, where, he told me recently, he was shocked by how dirty the air was: “You’d get scratchy eyes, your throat would start hurting. You couldn’t see very far. I thought, Why should people live like this?” He eventually wound up at Stanford, first as an undergraduate and then, in the mid-nineteen-nineties, as a professor of civil and environmental engineering, by which time it was clear that visible air pollution was only part of the problem. It was understood that the unseen gas produced by combustion—carbon dioxide—posed an even more comprehensive threat.

To get at both problems, Jacobson analyzed data to see if an early-model wind turbine sold by General Electric could compete with coal. He worked out its capacity by calculating its efficiency at average wind speeds; a paper he wrote, published in the journal Science in 2001, showed that you “could get rid of sixty per cent of coal in the U.S. with a modest number of turbines.” It was, he said, “the shortest paper I’ve ever written—three-quarters of a page in the journal—and it got the most feedback, almost all from haters.” He ignored them; soon he had a graduate student mapping wind speeds around the world, and then he expanded his work to other sources of renewable energy. In 2009, he and Mark Delucchi, a research scientist at the University of California, published a paper suggesting that hydroelectric, wind, and solar energy could conceivably supply enough power to meet all the world’s energy needs. The conventional wisdom at the time was that renewables were unreliable, because the sun insists on setting each night and the wind can turn fickle. In 2015, Jacobson wrote a paper for the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences , showing that, on the contrary, wind and solar energy could keep the electric grid running. That paper won a prestigious prize from the editors of the journal, but it didn’t prevent more pushback—a team of twenty academics from around the country published a rebuttal, stating that “policy makers should treat with caution any visions of a rapid, reliable, and low-cost transition to entire energy systems that relies almost exclusively on wind, solar, and hydroelectric power.”

Time, however, is proving Jacobson correct: a few nations—including Iceland, Costa Rica, Namibia, and Norway—are already producing more than ninety per cent of their electricity from clean sources. When Jacobson began his work, wind turbines were small fans atop California ridgelines, whirligigs that looked more like toys than power sources. Now G.E. routinely erects windmills about three times as tall as the Statue of Liberty, and, in August, a Chinese firm announced a new model, whose blades will sweep an area the size of six soccer fields, with each turbine generating enough power for twenty thousand homes. (An added benefit: bigger turbines kill fewer birds than smaller ones, though, in any event, tall buildings, power lines, and cats are responsible for far more avian deaths.) In December, Jacobson’s Stanford team published an updated analysis , stating that we have ninety-five per cent of the technology required to produce a hundred per cent of America’s power needs from renewable energy by 2035, while keeping the electric grid secure and reliable.

Making clean technology affordable is the other half of the challenge, and here the news is similarly upbeat. In September, after almost fifteen years of work, a team of researchers at Oxford University released a paper that is currently under peer review but which, fifty years from now, people may look back on as a landmark step in addressing the climate crisis. The lead author of the report is Oxford’s Rupert Way; the research team was led by an American named Doyne (pronounced “ dough -en”) Farmer.

Farmer grew up in New Mexico, a precocious physicist and mathematician. His first venture, formed while he was a graduate student at U.C. Santa Cruz, was called Eudaemonic Enterprises, after Aristotle’s term for the condition of human flourishing. The goal was to beat roulette wheels. Farmer wore a shoe (now housed in a German museum) with a computer in its sole, and watched as a croupier tossed a ball into a wheel; noting the ball’s initial position and velocity, he tapped his toe to send the information to the computer, which performed quick calculations, giving him a chance to make a considered bet in the few seconds the casino allowed. This achievement led him to building algorithms to beat the stock market—a statistical-arbitrage technique that underpinned an enterprise he co-founded called the Prediction Company, which was eventually sold to the Swiss banking giant UBS. Happily, Farmer eventually turned his talents to something of greater social worth: developing a way to forecast rates of technological progress. The basis for this work was research published in 1936, when Theodore Wright, an executive at the Curtiss Aeroplane Company, had noted that every time the production of airplanes doubled, the cost of building them fell by twenty per cent. Farmer and his colleagues were intrigued by this “learning curve” (and its semiconductor-era variant, Moore’s Law ); if you could figure out which technologies fit on the curve, and which didn’t, you’d be able to forecast the future.

“It was about fifteen years ago,” Farmer told me, in December. “I was at the Santa Fe Institute, and the head of the National Renewable Energy Lab came down. He said, ‘You guys are complex-systems people. Help us think outside the box—what are we missing?’ I had a Transylvanian postdoctoral fellow at the time, and he started putting together a database—he had high-school kids working on it, kids from St. John’s College in Santa Fe, anyone. And, as we looked at it, we saw this point about the improvement trends being persistent over time.” The first practical application of solar electricity was on the Vanguard I satellite, in 1958—practical if you had the budget of the space program. Yet the cost had been falling steadily, as people improved each generation of the technology—not because of one particular breakthrough or a single visionary entrepreneur but because of constant incremental improvement. Every time the number of solar panels manufactured doubles, the price drops another thirty per cent, which means that it’s currently falling about ten per cent every year.

But—and here’s the key—not all technologies follow this curve. “We looked at the price of coal over a hundred and forty years,” Farmer said. “Mines are much more sophisticated, the technology for locating new deposits is much better. But prices have not come down.” A likely explanation is that we got to all the easy stuff first: oil once bubbled up out of the ground; now we have to drill deep beneath the ocean for it. Whatever the reason, by 2013, the cost of a kilowatt-hour of solar energy had fallen by more than ninety-nine per cent since it was first used on the Vanguard I. Meanwhile, the price of coal has remained about the same. It was cheap to start, but it hasn’t gotten cheaper.

The more data sets that Farmer’s team members included, the more robust numbers they got, and by the autumn of 2021 they were ready to publish their findings. They found that the price trajectories of fossil fuels and renewables are already crossing. Renewable energy is now cheaper than fossil fuel, and becoming more so. So a “decisive transition” to renewable energy, they reported, would save the world twenty-six trillion dollars in energy costs in the coming decades.

This is precisely the opposite of how we have viewed energy transition. It has long been seen as an economically terrifying undertaking: if we had to transition to avoid calamity (and obviously we did), we should go as slowly as possible. Bill Gates, just last year, wrote a book, arguing that consumers would need to pay a “green premium” for clean energy because it would be more expensive. But Emily Grubert, a Georgia Tech engineer who now works for the Department of Energy, has recently shown that it could cost less to replace every coal plant in the country with renewables than to simply maintain the existing coal plants. You could call it a “green discount.”

The constant price drops mean, Farmer said, that we might still be able to move quickly enough to meet the target set in the 2016 Paris climate agreement of trying to limit temperature rise to 1.5 degrees Celsius. “One point five is going to suck,” he said. “But it sure beats three. We just need to put our money down and do it. So many people are pessimistic and despairing, and we need to turn that around.”

Numbers like Farmer’s make people who’ve been working in this field for years absolutely giddy. At COP 26, I retreated one day from Glasgow’s giant convention center to the relative quiet of the city’s university district for a pizza with a man named Kingsmill Bond. Bond is an Englishman and a former investment professional, and he looks the part: lean, in a bespoke suit, with a good haircut. His daughter, he said, was that day sitting her exams for Cambridge, the university he’d attended before a career at Citi and Deutsche Bank that had taken him to Hong Kong and Moscow. He’d quit some years ago, taking a cut in pay that he’s too modest to disclose. He’d worked first for the Carbon Tracker Initiative, in London, and now the Rocky Mountain Institute, based in Colorado, two groups working on energy transition.

He drew on a napkin excitedly, expounding on the numbers in the Oxford report. We would have to build out the electric grid to carry all the new power, and install millions of E.V. chargers, and so on, down a long list—amounting to maybe a trillion dollars in extra capital expenditure a year over the next two or three decades. But, in return, Bond said, we get an economic gift: “We save about two trillion dollars a year on fossil-fuel rents. Forever.” Fossil-fuel rent is what economists call the money that goes from consumers to those who control the hydrocarbon supply. Saudi Arabia can pull oil out of the ground for less than ten dollars a barrel and sell it at fifty or seventy-five dollars a barrel (or, during the emergency caused by Putin’s war, more than a hundred dollars); the difference is the rent they command. Bond insists that higher projections for the cost of the energy transition—a recent analysis from the consulting firm McKinsey predicted that it would cost trillions more than Farmer’s team did—ignore these rents, and also assume that, before long, renewable energy will veer from the steeply falling cost curve. Even if you’re pessimistic about how much it will cost to make the change, though, it’s clear that it would be far less expensive than not moving fast—that’s measured in hundreds of trillions of dollars but also in millions of lives and whatever value we place on maintaining an orderly civilization.

The new numbers turn the economic logic we’re used to upside down. A few years ago, at a petroleum-industry conference in Texas, the Canadian Prime Minister, Justin Trudeau, said something both terrible and true: that “no country would find a hundred and seventy-three billion barrels of oil in the ground and leave them there.” He was referring to Alberta’s tar sands, where a third of Canada’s natural gas is used to heat the oil trapped in the soil sufficiently to get it to flow to the surface and separate it from the sand. Just extracting the oil would put Canada over its share of the carbon budget set in Paris, and actually burning it would heat the planet nearly half a degree Celsius and use up about a third of the total remaining budget. (And Canadians account for only about one half of one per cent of the world’s population.)

Even on purely economic terms, such logic makes less sense with each passing quarter. That’s especially true for the eighty per cent of people in the world who live in countries that must import fossil fuels—for them it’s all cost and no gain. Even for petrostates, however, the spreadsheet is increasingly difficult to rationalize. Bond supplied some numbers: Canada has fossil-fuel reserves totalling a hundred and sixty-seven petawatt hours, which is a lot. (A petawatt is a quadrillion watts.) But, he said, it has potential renewable energy from wind and solar power alone of seventy-one petawatt hours a year . A reasonable question to ask Trudeau would be: What kind of country finds a windfall like that and simply leaves it in the sky?

Making the energy transition won’t be easy, of course. Because we’ve been burning fuel to power our economies for more than two hundred years, we have in place long and robust supply chains and deep technical expertise geared to a combustion economy. “We’ve tried to think about possible infrastructure walls that might get in the way,” Farmer said. That’s a virtue of this kind of learning-curve analysis: if renewable energy has overcome obstacles in the past to keep dropping in price, it will probably be able to do so again. A few years ago, for instance, a number of reports said that the windmill business might crash because it was running short of the balsa wood used in turbine blades. But, within a year of the shortages emerging, many of the big windmill makers had started substituting a synthetic foam.

Now the focus is on minerals, such as cobalt, that are used in solar panels and batteries. Late last year, the Times published a long investigation of the success that China has had in cornering the world’s supply of the metal, which is found most abundantly in the Democratic Republic of the Congo. Brian Menell, the C.E.O. of TechMet, a supplier of cobalt and other specialty metals, told me, “We run the risk that in five years, the factories for E.V.s will be sitting half idle, because those companies—the Fords and General Motors and Teslas and VWs—will not be able to secure the feedstock to maintain the capacity they’re building now.” But the fact that the Fords and G.M.s are in the hunt means that the political weight for what Menell calls a “massive and coördinated effort by government and end users” is likely to develop. Humans are good at solving the kind of dilemmas represented by scarcity. A Ford spokesman told the Times that the company is learning to recycle cobalt and to develop substitutes, adding, “We do not see cobalt as a constraining issue.”

Harder to solve may be the human-rights challenges that come with new mining efforts, such as the use of so-called “artisanal” cobalt mining, in which impoverished workers pry the metal from the ground with spades, or the plan to build a lithium mine on a site in Nevada that is sacred to Indigenous peoples. But, as we work to tackle those problems, it’s worth remembering that a transition to renewable energy would, by some estimates, reduce the total global mining burden by as much as eighty per cent, because so much of what we dig up today is burned (and then we have to go dig up some more). You dig up lithium once, and put it to use for decades in a solar panel or battery. In fact, a switch to renewable energy will reduce the load on all kinds of systems. At the moment, roughly forty per cent of the cargo carried by ocean-going ships is coal, gas, oil, and wood pellets—a never-ending stream of vessels crammed full of stuff to burn. You need a ship to carry a wind turbine blade, too, if it’s coming from across the sea, but you only need it once. A solar panel or a windmill, once erected, stands for a quarter of a century or longer. The U.S. military is the world’s largest single consumer of fossil fuels, but seventy per cent of its logistical “lift capacity” is devoted solely to transporting the fossil fuels used to keep the military machine running.

Raw materials aren’t the only possible pinch point. We’re also short of some kinds of expertise. Saul Griffith is perhaps the world’s leading apostle of electrification. (His 2021 book is called “ Electrify .”) An Australian by birth, he has spent recent years in Silicon Valley, rallying entrepreneurs to the project of installing E.V. chargers, air-source heat pumps, induction cooktops, and the like. He can show that they save homeowners, landlords, and businesses money; he’s also worked out the numbers to show that banks can prosper by extending, in essence, mortgages for these improvements. But he told me that, to stay within the 1.5 degree Celsius range, “America is going to need a million more electricians this decade.” That’s not impossible . Working as an electrician is a good job, and community colleges and apprenticeship programs could train many more people to become one. But, as with the rest of the transition, it’s going to take leadership and coördination to make it happen.

Change on this scale would be difficult even if everyone was working in good faith, and not everyone is. So far, for instance, the climate provisions of the Build Back Better Act, which would help provide, among many other things, training for renewable-energy installers, have been blocked not just by the oil-dominated G.O.P. but by Joe Manchin , the Democrat who received more fossil-fuel donations in the past election cycle than anyone else in the Senate. The thirty-year history of the global-warming fight is largely a story of the efforts by the fossil-fuel industry to deny the need for change, or, more recently, to insist that it must come slowly.

The fossil-fuel industry wants to be able to keep burning something. That way, it can keep both its infrastructure and its business model usefully employed. It’s like an industry of rational pyromania. A decade or so ago, the thing it wanted to burn next was natural gas. Since it produces less carbon dioxide than coal does, it was billed as the “bridge fuel” that would get us to renewables. The logic seemed sound. But researchers, led by Bob Howarth, at Cornell University, found that producing large quantities of natural gas released large quantities of methane into the atmosphere. And methane (CH 4 ) is, like CO 2 , a potent heat-trapping gas, so it’s become clear that natural gas is a bridge fuel to nowhere—clear, that is, to everyone but the industry. The head of a big gas firm told a conference in Texas last week that he thought the domestic gas industry could be producing for the next hundred years.

Other parts of the industry want to go further back in time and burn wood; the European Union and the United States officially class “biomass burning” as carbon neutral. The city of Burlington, in my home state of Vermont, claims to source all its energy from renewables, but much of its electricity comes from a plant that burns trees. Again, the logic originally seemed sound: if you cut a tree, another grows in its place, and it will eventually soak up the carbon dioxide emitted from that burning the first tree. But, again, “eventually” is the problem . Burning wood is highly inefficient, and so it releases a huge pulse of carbon right now , when the world’s climate system is most vulnerable. Trees that grow back in a few generations’ time will come too late to save the ice caps. The world’s largest wood-burning plant is in England, run by a company called Drax; the plant used to burn coal, and it does scarcely less damage now than it did then. In January, news came that Enviva, a company based in Maryland that is the largest producer of wood pellets in the world, plans to double its output.

Or consider the huge sums of money in the bipartisan infrastructure bill passed last year, which will support another technology called carbon capture. This involves fitting power plants with enough filters and pipes so that they can go on burning coal or gas, but capture the CO 2 that pours out of the smokestacks and pipe it safely away—into an old salt mine, perhaps. (Or, ironically, into a depleted oil well, where it may be used to push more crude to the surface.) So far, these carbon-capture schemes don’t really work—but, even if they did, why spend the money to outfit systems with pipes and filters when solar power is already cheaper than coal power? We will have to remove some of the carbon in the atmosphere, and new generations of direct-air-capture machines may someday play a role, if their cost drops quickly. (They use chemicals to filter carbon straight from the ambient air; think of them as artificial trees.) But using this technology to lengthen the lifespan of coal-fired power plants is just one more gift to a politically connected industry.

Increasingly, the fossil-fuel industry is turning toward hydrogen as an out. Hydrogen does burn cleanly, without contributing to global warming, but the industry likes hydrogen because one way to produce it is by burning natural gas. And, as Howarth and Jacobson demonstrated in a recent paper, even if you combine burning that gas with expensive carbon capture, the methane that leaks from the frack wells is enough to render the whole process ruinous environmentally, and it makes no sense economically without huge subsidies.

There is another way to produce hydrogen, and, in time, it will almost certainly fuel the last big artificial fires on our planet. Through electrolysis, hydrogen can be separated from oxygen in water. And if the electricity used in the process is renewably produced then this “green hydrogen” would allow countries such as Japan, Singapore, and Korea, which may struggle to find enough space in their landscapes for renewable-energy generation, to power their grids. The Australian billionaire Andrew Forrest, the founder of the Fortescue Metals Group, is proposing to use solar power to produce green hydrogen that he can then ship to those countries. In January, Mukesh Ambani, the head of Reliance Industries and the richest man in India, announced plans to spend seventy-five billion dollars on the technology. Airbus recently predicted that green hydrogen could fuel its long-haul planes by 2035. And the good news—though Doyne Farmer cautions that the data sets are still pretty scanty—is that the electrolyzers which use solar energy to produce hydrogen seem to be on the same downward cost curve as solar panels, wind turbines, and batteries.

The fossil-fuel industry can be relied on to fight these shifts. Last autumn, a utility company in Oklahoma announced that it would charge fourteen hundred dollars to disconnect residential gas lines and move home stoves and furnaces to electricity. Within days, other utilities followed suit. That’s why the climate movement is increasingly taking on the banks that make loans for the expansion of fossil-fuel infrastructure. Last year, the International Energy Agency said that such expansion needed to end immediately if we are to meet the Paris targets, yet the world’s biggest banks, while making noises about “net zero by 2050,” continue to lend to new pipelines and wells. The issue came to the fore earlier this year, when Joe Biden nominated Sarah Bloom Raskin to the position of vice-chair for supervision at the Federal Reserve. “There is opportunity in pre-emptive, early and bold actions by federal economic policy makers looking to avoid catastrophe,” Raskin wrote in 2020. And it’s why certain lawmakers mobilized to stop her nomination . Senator Patrick Toomey, of Pennsylvania, who was the Senate’s sixth-biggest recipient of oil-and-gas contributions during his last campaign, in 2016 (he is not running for reëlection this year), said that Raskin “has specifically called for the Fed to pressure banks to choke off credit to traditional energy companies.” She’s tried, in other words, to extinguish the flames a little—and on Monday, for her pains, Manchin effectively derailed her nomination, saying that he would vote against her, because she “failed to satisfactorily address my concerns about the critical importance of financing an all-of-the-above energy policy.” On Tuesday, she withdrew her nomination .

The shift away from combustion is large and novel enough that it bumps up against everyone’s prior assumptions—environmentalists’, too. The fight against nuclear power, for example, was an early mainstay of the green movement, because it was easy to see that if something went wrong it could go badly wrong. I applauded, more than a decade ago, when the Vermont legislature voted to close the state’s old nuclear plant at the end of its working life, but I wouldn’t today. Indeed, for some years I’ve argued that existing nuclear reactors that can still be run with any margin of safety probably should be, as we’re making the transition—the spent fuel they produce is an evil inheritance for our descendants, but it’s not as dangerous as an overheated Earth, even if the scenes of Russian troops shelling nuclear plants added to the sense of horror enveloping the planet these past weeks. Yet the rapidly falling cost of renewables also indicates why new nuclear plants will have a hard time finding backers; it’s evaporating nuclear power’s one big advantage—that it’s always on. Farmer’s Oxford team ran the numbers. “If the cost of coal is flat, and the cost of solar is plummeting, nuclear is the rare technology whose cost is going up,” he said. Advocates will argue that this is because safety fears have driven up the cost of construction. “But the only place on Earth where you can find the cost of nuclear coming down is Korea,” Farmer said. “Even there, the rate of decline is one per cent a year. Compared to ten per cent for renewables, that’s not enough to matter.”

Accepting nuclear power for a while longer is not the only place environmentalists will need to bend. A reason I supported shutting down Vermont’s nuclear plant was because campaigners had promised that its output would be replaced with renewable energy. In the years that followed, though, advocates of scenery, wildlife, and forests managed to put the state’s mountaintops off limits to wind turbines. More recently, the state’s public-utility commission blocked construction of an eight-acre solar farm on aesthetic grounds. Those of us who live in and love rural areas have to accept that some of that landscape will be needed to produce energy. Not all of it, or even most of it—Jacobson’s latest numbers show that renewable power actually uses less land than fossil fuels, which require drilling fifty thousand new holes every year in North America alone. But we do need to see our landscape differently—as Ezra Klein wrote this week in the Times , “to conserve anything close to the climate we’ve had, we need to build as we’ve never built before.”

Corn fields, for instance, are a classic American sight, but they’re also just solar-energy collectors of another sort. (And ones requiring annual applications of nitrogen, which eventually washes into lakes and rivers, causing big algae blooms.) More than half the corn grown in Iowa actually ends up as ethanol in the tanks of cars and trucks—in other words, those fields are already growing fuel, just inefficiently. Because solar panels are far more efficient than photosynthesis, and because E.V.s are far more efficient than cars with gas engines, Jacobson’s data show that, by switching from ethanol to solar, you could produce eighty times the amount of automobile mileage using an equivalent area of land. And the transition could bring some advantages: the market for electrons is predictable, so solar panels can provide a fairly stable income for farmers, some of whom are learning to grow shade-tolerant crops or to graze animals around and beneath them.

Another concession will strike many environmentalists more deeply even than accepting a degraded landscape, and that’s the notion that reckoning with the climate crisis would force wholesale changes in the way that people live their lives. Remember, the long-held assumption was that renewable energy was going to be expensive and limited in supply. So, it was thought, this would move us in the direction of simpler, less energy-intensive ways of life, something that many of us welcomed, in part because there are deep environmental challenges that go beyond carbon and climate. Cheap new energy technologies may let us evade some of those more profound changes. Whenever I write about the rise of E.V.s, Twitter responds that we’d be better off riding bikes and electric buses. In many ways we would be, and some cities are thankfully starting to build extensive bike paths and rapid-transit lanes for electric buses. But, as of 2017, just two per cent of passenger miles in this country come from public transportation. Bike commuting has doubled in the past two decades—to about one per cent of the total. We could (and should) quintuple the number of people riding bikes and buses, and even then we’d still need to replace tens of millions of cars with E.V.s to meet the targets in the time the scientists have set to meet them. That time is the crucial variable. As hard as it will be to rewire the planet’s energy system by decade’s end, I think it would be harder—impossible, in fact—to sufficiently rewire social expectations, consumer preferences, and settlement patterns in that short stretch.

So one way to look at the work that must be done with the tools we have at hand is as triage. If we do it quickly, we will open up more possibilities for the generations to come. Just one example: Farmer says that it’s possible to see the cost of nuclear-fusion reactors, as opposed to the current fission reactors, starting to come steeply down the cost curve—and to imagine that a within a generation or two people may be taking solar panels off farm fields, because fusion (which is essentially the physics of the sun brought to Earth) may be providing all the power we need. If we make it through the bottleneck of the next decade, much may be possible.

There is one ethical element of the energy transition that we can’t set aside: the climate crisis is deeply unfair—by and large, the less you did to cause it, the harder and faster it hits you—but in the course of trying to fix it we do have an opportunity to also remedy some of that unfairness. For Americans, the best part of the Build Back Better bill may be that it tries to target significant parts of its aid to communities hardest hit by poverty and environmental damage, a residue of the Green New Deal that is its parent. And advocates are already pressing to insure that at least some of the new technology is owned by local communities—by churches and local development agencies, not by the solar-era equivalents of Koch Industries or Exxon.

Advocates are also calling for some of the first investments in green transformations to happen in public-housing projects, on reservations, and in public schools serving low-income students. There can be some impatience from environmentalists who worry that such considerations might slow down the transition. But, as Naomi Klein recently told me, “The hard truth is that environmentalists can’t win the emission-reduction fight on our own. Winning will take sweeping alliances beyond the self-identified green bubble—with trade unions, housing-rights advocates, racial-justice organizers, teachers, transit workers, nurses, artists, and more. But, to build that kind of coalition, climate action needs to hold out the promise of making daily life better for the people who are most neglected right away—not far off in the future. Green, affordable homes and water that is safe to drink is something people will fight for a hell of a lot harder than carbon pricing.”

These are principles that must apply around the world, for basic fairness and because solving the climate crisis in just the U.S. would be the most pyrrhic of victories. (They don’t call it “global warming” for nothing.) In Glasgow, I sat down with Mohamed Nasheed, the former President of the Maldives and the current speaker of the People’s Majlis, the nation’s legislative body. He has been at the forefront of climate action for decades, because the highest land in his country, an archipelago that stretches across the equator in the Indian Ocean, is just a few metres above sea level. At COP 26, he was representing the Climate Vulnerable Forum, a consortium of fifty-five of the nations with the most to lose as temperatures rise. As he noted, poor countries have gone deeply into debt trying to deal with the effects of climate change. If they need to move an airport or shore up seawalls, or recover from a devastating hurricane or record rainfall, borrowing may be their only recourse. And borrowing gets harder, in part, because the climate risks mean that lenders demand more. The climate premium on loans may approach ten per cent, Nasheed said; some nations are already spending twenty per cent of their budgets just paying interest. He suggested that it might be time for a debt strike by poor nations.

The rapid fall in renewable-energy prices makes it more possible to imagine the rest of the world chipping in. So far, though, the rich countries haven’t even come up with the climate funds they promised the Global South more than a decade ago, much less any compensation for the ongoing damage that they have done the most to cause. (All of sub-Saharan Africa is responsible for less than two per cent of the carbon emissions currently heating the earth; the United States is responsible for twenty-five per cent.)

Tom Athanasiou’s Berkeley-based organization EcoEquity, as part of the Climate Equity Reference Project, has done the most detailed analyses of who owes what in the climate fight. He found that the U.S. would have to cut its emissions a hundred and seventy-five per cent to make up for the damage it’s already caused—a statistical impossibility. Therefore, the only way it can meet that burden is to help the rest of the world transition to clean energy, and to help bear the costs that global warming has already produced. As Athanasiou put it, “The pressing work of decarbonization is only going to be embraced by the people of the Global South if it comes as part of a package that includes adaptation aid and disaster relief.”

I said at the start that there is one sublime exception to the rule that we should be dousing fires, and that is the use of flame to control flame, and to manage land—a skill developed over many millennia by the original inhabitants of much of the world. Of all the fires burning on Earth, none are more terrifying than the conflagrations that light the arid West, the Mediterranean, the eucalyptus forests of Australia, and the boreal woods of Siberia and the Canadian north. By last summer, blazes in Oregon and Washington and British Columbia were fouling the air across the continent in New York and New England. Smoke from fires in the Russian far north choked the sky above the North Pole. For people in these regions, fire has become a scary psychological companion during the hot and dry months—and those months stretch out longer each year. The San Francisco Chronicle recently asked whether parts of California, once the nation’s idyll, were now effectively uninhabitable. In Siberia, even last winter’s icy cold was not enough to blot out the blazes; researchers reported “zombie fires” smoking and smoldering beneath feet of snow. There’s no question that the climate crisis is driving these great blazes—and also being driven by them, since they put huge clouds of carbon into the air.

There’s also little question, at least in the West, that the fires, though sparked by our new climate, feed on an accumulation of fuel left there by a century of a strict policy which treated any fire as a threat to be extinguished immediately. That policy ignored millennia of Indigenous experience using fire as a tool, an experience now suddenly in great demand. Indigenous people around the world have been at the forefront of the climate movement, and they have often been skilled early adopters of renewable energy. But they have also, in the past, been able to use fire to fight fire: to burn when the risk is low, in an effort to manage landscapes for safety and for productivity.

Frank Lake, a descendant of the Karuk tribe indigenous to what is now northern California, works as a research ecologist at the U.S. Forest Service, and he is helping to recover this old and useful technology. He described a controlled burn in the autumn of 2015 near his house on the Klamath River. “I have legacy acorn trees on my property,” he said—meaning the great oaks that provided food for tribal people in ages past—but those trees were hemmed in by fast-growing shrubs. “So we had twenty-something fire personnel there that day, and they had their equipment, and they laid hose. And I gave the operational briefing. I said, ‘We’re going to be burning today to reduce hazardous fuels. And also so we can gather acorns more easily, without the undergrowth, and the pests attacking the trees.’ My wife was there and my five-year-old son and my three-year-old daughter. And I lit a branch from a lightning-struck sugar pine—it conveys its medicine from the lightning—and with that I lit everyone’s drip torches, and then they went to work burning. My son got to walk hand-in-hand down the fire line with the burn boss.”

Lake’s work at the Forest Service involves helping tribes burn again. It’s not always easy; some have been so decimated by the colonial experience that they’ve lost their traditions. “Maybe they have two or three generations that haven’t been allowed to burn,” he said. There are important pockets of residual knowledge, often among elders, but they can be reluctant to share that knowledge with others, Lake told me, “fearful that it will be co-opted and that they’ll be kept out of the leadership and decision-making.” But, for half a decade, the Indigenous Peoples Burning Network—organized by various tribes, the Nature Conservancy, and government agencies, including the Forest Service—has slowly been expanding across the country. There are outposts in Oregon, Minnesota, New Mexico, and in other parts of the world. Lake has travelled to Australia to learn from aboriginal practitioners. “It’s family-based burning. The kids get a Bic lighter and burn a little patch of eucalyptus. The teen-agers a bigger area, adults much bigger swaths. I just saw it all unfold.” As that knowledge and confidence is recovered, it’s possible to imagine a world in which we’ve turned off most of the man-made fires, and Indigenous people teach the rest of us to use fire as the important force it was when we first discovered it.

Amy Cardinal Christianson, who works for the Canadian equivalent of the Forest Service, is a member of the Métis Nation. Her family kept trapping lines near Fort McMurray, in northern Alberta, but left them for the city because the development of the vast tar-sands complex overwhelmed the landscape. (That’s the hundred and seventy-three billion barrels that Justin Trudeau says no country would leave in the ground—a pool of carbon so vast the climate scientist James Hansen said that pumping it from the ground would mean “game over for the climate.”) The industrial fires it stoked have helped heat the Earth, and one result was a truly terrifying forest fire that overtook Fort McMurray in 2016, after a stretch of unseasonably high temperatures. The blaze forced the evacuation of eighty-eight thousand people, and became the costliest disaster in Canadian history.

“What we’re seeing now is bad fire,” Christianson said. “When we talk about returning fire to the landscape, we’re talking about good fire. I heard an elder describe it once as fire you could walk next to, fire of a low intensity.” Fire that builds a mosaic of landscapes that, in turn, act as natural firebreaks against devastating blazes; fire that opens meadows where wildlife can flourish. “Fire is a kind of medicine for the land. And it lets you carry out your culture—like, why you are in the world, basically.”

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Essay on Renewable Energy

Introduction to Renewable Energy

In the quest for a sustainable and environmentally conscious future, adopting renewable energy has emerged as a pivotal solution to mitigate the challenges posed by traditional fossil fuels. Take, for instance, the remarkable growth of solar power in countries like Germany, where the “Energiewende” policy has catapulted them to the forefront of green energy innovation. This transformative journey showcases the potential of harnessing solar energy as an alternative and a cornerstone for economic prosperity, reduced carbon emissions, and heightened energy security. As we delve into the world of renewable energy, it becomes evident that these innovations are key to shaping a cleaner, more resilient global energy landscape.

Importance of Transitioning to Renewable Sources

A sustainable future and resolving numerous global issues depend heavily on the switch to renewable energy sources. This shift is crucial for several reasons:

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• Environmental Preservation: Fossil fuel combustion contributes significantly to air and water pollution and climate change. Transitioning to renewables reduces greenhouse gas emissions, mitigates environmental degradation, and helps preserve ecosystems.
• Climate Change Mitigation: Renewable energy is a key player in mitigating climate change . Reducing greenhouse gas emissions, including carbon dioxide, is crucial to prevent catastrophic outcomes such as extreme weather events and rising sea levels.
• Energy Security: Wind and solar power, as renewable energy sources, provide a diverse and decentralized energy supply. This reduces dependence on finite and geopolitically sensitive fossil fuel reserves, enhancing energy security and resilience.
• Economic Opportunities: The renewable energy sector fosters job creation and economic growth. Investments in clean energy technologies stimulate innovation, create employment opportunities, and contribute to developing a robust and sustainable economy.
• Public Health Improvement: Transitioning away from fossil fuels decreases the release of harmful pollutants, leading to improved air and water quality. This, in turn, positively impacts public health by reducing respiratory illnesses and other pollution-related diseases.
• Resource Conservation: Unlike finite fossil fuel reserves, renewable sources are inherently sustainable and inexhaustible. By harnessing the power of sunlight, wind, water, and geothermal heat, societies can meet their energy needs without depleting limited natural resources.
• Technological Advancements: The transition to renewables drives innovation and technological advancements. Research and development in clean energy technologies contribute to a cleaner environment and the advancement of scientific knowledge and industrial capabilities.
• Global Cooperation: The shift to renewable energy encourages international collaboration to address shared challenges. Collaborative efforts in research, development, and the adoption of clean energy technologies can foster diplomatic ties and strengthen global cooperation.

Types of Renewable Energy

Sources naturally replenished on a human timescale, making them sustainable and environmentally friendly, derive renewable energy. Listed below are the main types of renewable energy:

• Solar Power: While solar thermal systems use sunshine to heat a fluid that produces steam to power turbines, photovoltaic cells use sunlight to convert light into energy.
• Wind Energy: Wind turbines are machines that use the wind’s kinetic energy to generate electricity through wind energy. When the wind rotates the turbine blades, a generator transforms that rotational energy into electrical energy. Onshore or offshore locations often host wind farms.
• Hydropower: Hydropower produces electricity by harnessing the energy of flowing water. Run-of-river systems divert a portion of a river’s flow, while dam-based hydropower involves the controlled release of stored water through turbines to generate power.
• Biomass Energy: Organic materials like wood, agricultural waste, and agricultural residues produce biomass energy. Biomass can produce heat, electricity, and biofuels through combustion or anaerobic digestion, offering a versatile energy source.
• Geothermal Energy: Geothermal energy taps into the Earth’s internal heat by harnessing steam or hot water beneath the Earth’s surface. Geothermal power plants convert this thermal energy into electricity, providing a consistent and reliable power source.
• Tidal Energy: Tidal energy harnesses the moon’s and sun’s gravitational pull to create electricity as the tides rise and fall. Utilizing underwater turbines allows tidal stream devices to capture the energy of the water’s flow.
• Wave Energy: Wave energy captures the motion of ocean waves to generate electricity. Wave energy converters, including point absorbers and oscillating water columns, convert waves’ up and down motion into usable power.
• Hydrogen Energy: Hydrogen, often considered a carrier of energy, can be produced through electrolysis using renewable electricity. It is a clean fuel for various applications, including transportation and industrial processes, emitting only water vapor when used.

Technological advancements

Technological breakthroughs have shaped the modern world, revolutionizing industries and elevating people’s standard of living. Several key areas highlight the profound impact of technology on society:

• Information Technology (IT): The evolution of IT has transformed communication, information access, and business operations. The development of the Internet, cloud computing , and mobile technologies has facilitated instantaneous global communication, d ata storage , and access to vast amounts of information.
• Artificial Intelligence & Machine Learning: AI and ML have ushered in a new era of automation and decision-making capabilities. From autonomous vehicles to predictive analytics in healthcare, these technologies continue to enhance efficiency, accuracy, and problem-solving across various industries.
• Biotechnology: Advances in biotechnology have revolutionized healthcare, agriculture, and environmental conservation. Gene editing tools like CRISPR-Cas9 offer unprecedented possibilities in treating genetic disorders, while biotech applications in agriculture improve crop yield and resilience.
• Renewable Energy Technologies: Clean energy generation is now more economical and efficient thanks to renewable energy technology, including energy storage systems, wind turbines, and solar panels. These innovations are pivotal in addressing environmental challenges and promoting sustainable practices.
• Nanotechnology: Nanotechnology manipulates materials at the atomic or molecular level. Nanotechnology has transformed the fields of materials science, electronics, and medicine. As a result, scientists have created sophisticated materials with unique qualities, developed more compact and potent electrical devices, and improved medication delivery methods.
• 3D Printing: Layer-by-layer construction of three-dimensional items is possible with additive manufacturing, also known as 3D printing. This technology utilizes diverse applications, from prototyping and manufacturing to healthcare, producing custom implants and prosthetics.
• Blockchain Technology: The decentralized and secure ledger technology known as blockchain powers cryptocurrencies such as Bitcoin . Beyond finance, it finds applications in supply chain management , voting systems, and ensuring the integrity and transparency of various processes.
• Quantum Computing: Using the ideas of quantum mechanics, quantum computing can execute intricate calculations at a pace impossible for conventional computers. This can potentially revolutionize fields such as cryptography, optimization problems, and drug discovery.
• Internet of Things (IoT): The technology known as the Internet of Things (IoT) enables commonplace objects to be linked to the Internet and gather and share data. This interconnectedness enhances efficiency in smart homes, cities, and industries, optimizing resource utilization and overall productivity.
• Augmented and Virtual Reality (AR/VR): AR and VR technologies immerse users in virtual or augmented environments, transforming experiences in fields like gaming, education, healthcare, and training simulations.

Challenges and Solutions

Addressing the challenges posed by technological advancements, societal changes, and global issues requires proactive strategies and innovative solutions. Here are some main challenges and possible solutions:

• Cybersecurity Threats:
• Challenge: Due to the growing interconnectivity of systems and the dependence on digital technology, individuals and organizations are more vulnerable to cyber threats such as ransomware attacks and data breaches.
• Solution: Implementing robust cybersecurity measures, regular updates, and user education can help mitigate cyber risks. Collaboration between governments, industries, and cybersecurity experts is crucial for developing effective strategies.
• Privacy Concerns:
• Challenge: The collection and utilization of personal data by companies and governments raise concerns about privacy infringement.
• Solution: Implemented to safeguard people’s privacy rights, GDPR (the General Data Protection Regulation) and other stricter laws and policies exist. Innovations like privacy-enhancing technologies and decentralized identity solutions offer alternative approaches.
• Job Displacement Due to Automation:
• Challenge: Automation and artificial intelligence technologies can lead to job displacement and economic inequality.
• Solution: Reskilling and upskilling programs and focusing on education in emerging fields can prepare the workforce for the changing job landscape. Social policies like universal basic income (UBI) may provide a safety net during transitions.
• Environmental Degradation:
• Challenge: Industrial activities and resource exploitation contribute to environmental degradation, climate change, and biodiversity loss.
• Solution: Sustainable practices, renewable energy adoption, and circular economy principles can mitigate environmental impact. International cooperation and stringent environmental regulations also play a crucial role.
• Ethical Concerns in AI:
• Challenge: Ethical issues surrounding artificial intelligence include biased algorithms, lack of transparency, and potential misuse.
• Solution: Implementing ethical guidelines and standards for AI development, promoting transparency in algorithms, and fostering interdisciplinary collaboration on AI ethics can help address these concerns.
• Healthcare Access Disparities:
• Challenge: Access to quality healthcare is unique globally, with disparities exacerbated by factors such as geography and socioeconomic status.
• Solution: Telemedicine, mobile health applications, and innovative healthcare delivery models can improve access. International collaborations and investment in healthcare infrastructure can reduce disparities.
• Digital Inequality:
• Challenge: Not everyone has equal access to digital technologies, leading to disparities in education, economic opportunities, and social inclusion.
• Solution: Initiatives focusing on digital literacy, affordable internet access, and technology inclusion programs can bridge the digital divide. Governments and organizations can also invest in infrastructure to expand connectivity.
• Global Public Health Crises:
• Challenge: Events like pandemics can strain healthcare systems, disrupt economies, and create social upheaval.
• Solution: Preparedness plans, early warning systems, and international cooperation in research and resource allocation are crucial. Advances in biotechnology and data analytics can aid in swift responses.
• Ethical Use of Biotechnology:
• Challenge: Biotechnological advancements like gene editing raise ethical concerns about human enhancement and unintended consequences.
• Solution: Robust ethical frameworks, public engagement, and interdisciplinary dialogues involving ethicists, scientists, and policymakers can guide responsible biotechnological development.
• Energy Transition Challenges:
• Challenge: Shifting from traditional to renewable energy sources faces infrastructure, economic viability, and societal acceptance challenges.
• Solution: Government incentives, public awareness campaigns, and investment in research and development can accelerate the transition. Community involvement and stakeholder engagement are critical for successful adoption.

Global Initiatives and Policies

Global initiatives and policies play a pivotal role in shaping the trajectory of technological, economic, and environmental progress. These initiatives often reflect the collective effort of nations to address shared challenges and promote cooperation in various domains. Here are some notable global initiatives and policies:

• Paris Agreement: Global leaders reached a global agreement to keep the rise in temperature to less than 2°C above pre-industrial levels. Nations aim to enhance climate resilience while reducing greenhouse gas emissions.
• United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs): The 17 goals address global issues, including poverty, inequality, and environmental sustainability. Goal 7 targets explicitly affordable and clean energy, promoting the transition to renewable sources.
• IRENA(International Renewable Energy Agency): An intergovernmental organization promoting the widespread use of renewable energy. IRENA facilitates cooperation among nations, provides policy advice, and supports capacity building for renewable energy projects.
• Clean Energy Ministerial (CEM): A forum bringing together energy ministers from various nations to promote clean energy policies, share best practices, and collaborate on initiatives to advance the global transition to low-carbon technologies.
• Mission Innovation: A global initiative involving 24 countries and the European Union, committed to doubling public investment in clean energy research and development over five years. It aims to accelerate innovation and make clean energy more affordable.
• European Green Deal: An ambitious EU policy framework aiming for climate neutrality by 2050. It describes plans to lower greenhouse gas emissions, support renewable energy, and completely revamp the European economy.
• Renewable Energy Policies at National Levels: Many countries have established specific policies and targets to promote renewable energy adoption. Examples include Germany’s Energiewende, India’s National Solar Mission, and China’s commitment to peak carbon emissions by 2030.
• Power Africa: An initiative by the U.S. government to increase access to electricity in sub-Saharan Africa. Its main objectives are to encourage investment in the region’s power sector and to facilitate the development of renewable energy projects.
• Global Geothermal Alliance: Launched at COP21, the alliance promotes geothermal energy deployment worldwide. It encourages collaboration between governments, development partners, and the private sector to harness the potential of geothermal resources.
• ESMAP (World Bank’s Energy Sector Management Assistance Program): ESMAP supports developing countries in building sustainable energy systems. It provides technical assistance, policy advice, and financial support for projects promoting renewable energy and energy efficiency.

Case Studies

• Germany’s Energiewende: Germany’s ambitious energy transition, known as Energiewende, aims to shift from conventional energy sources to renewable energy. The country has made significant investments in wind and solar energy, enacted energy-saving measures, and plans to phase out nuclear power. The Energiewende case study exemplifies the integration of renewables into the energy mix and the challenges of maintaining grid balance during this transition.
• China’s Renewable Energy Expansion: China has become a global leader in renewable energy deployment. The country has significantly invested in wind and solar energy projects, increasing capacity. The case study explores China’s policy incentives, market dynamics, and technological advancements that have facilitated its rapid expansion in the renewable energy sector.
• Denmark’s Wind Power Success: Denmark has been a pioneer in wind energy, with wind power contributing significantly to its electricity generation. The case study delves into Denmark’s wind energy policies, including favorable regulatory frameworks, community engagement, and advancements in wind turbine technology. It highlights the economic and environmental benefits of widespread wind power adoption.
• California’s Renewable Energy Leadership: In the US, California has used renewable energy. The state’s case study examines its aggressive renewable portfolio standards, innovative policies promoting solar power, and the role of technology companies in driving clean energy initiatives. California’s experience demonstrates the potential for subnational entities to lead in renewable energy transitions.
• Rural Electrification in India through Solar Power: India’s case study focuses on rural electrification efforts using solar power. Initiatives like the National Solar Mission and off-grid solar projects have brought electricity to remote areas, transforming lives and fostering economic development. The study explores the challenges faced and lessons learned in scaling up solar energy access in a diverse and populous country.
• Costa Rica’s Renewable Energy Achievement: Costa Rica stands out for achieving high levels of renewable energy generation, primarily from hydropower, wind, and geothermal sources. The case study examines the country’s commitment to environmental sustainability, policies promoting clean energy, and the role of hydropower in maintaining a reliable and renewable energy supply.
• South Australia’s Grid Transformation: South Australia’s case study illustrates its transition to a renewable energy-dominant grid. The state has faced challenges related to grid stability and intermittency but has also demonstrated successful integration of wind and solar power. The study delves into the policy measures, technological solutions, and lessons learned in South Australia’s journey toward a low-carbon energy system.
• Morocco’s Concentrated Solar Power Project: Morocco’s case study focuses on the Noor Ouarzazate Solar Complex, one of the world’s most significant concentrated solar power projects. The initiative aims to harness solar energy for electricity generation, reduce dependence on fossil fuels, and contribute to national energy security. The study explores the project’s technological innovations, financing models, and the impact on Morocco’s energy landscape.

Future Prospects

The future of energy holds exciting possibilities as technological advancements and evolving societal priorities shape the landscape. Several key prospects are likely to influence the trajectory of the global energy sector:

• Emerging Technologies: Ongoing research and development in renewable energy technologies will likely yield breakthroughs in efficiency, cost-effectiveness, and energy storage. Innovations such as advanced solar cells, next-generation wind turbines, and novel energy storage solutions will be crucial in shaping the future energy landscape.
• Tidal and Wave Energy: Tidal and wave energy, largely untapped at present, hold significant potential for sustainable power generation. As technologies mature, harnessing the kinetic energy of ocean tides and waves could contribute to a more diverse and reliable renewable energy mix.
• Advanced Solar Technologies: Continued advancements in solar technologies, including thin-film solar cells, tandem solar cells, and solar paint, are anticipated. These innovations aim to enhance the efficiency of solar energy capture and broaden its applications across various industries.
• Integration into Various Sectors: One of the most important aspects of the energy landscape of the future is integrating renewable energy into various sectors, including industrial processes and transportation. Electric vehicles, green hydrogen production, and sustainable manufacturing will likely gain prominence.
• Energy Transition in Developing Countries: A significant role in the global energy transition is expected to be played by developing countries. International collaborations, financial support, and technology transfer will empower these nations to leapfrog traditional fossil fuel-dependent phases of development and embrace cleaner energy solutions.
• Smart Grids and Energy Storage: Deploying smart power grids, in conjunction with advanced energy storage solutions, will simplify the integration of renewable energy resources in existing power systems. Battery technologies, grid-scale storage, and demand-response mechanisms will enhance grid reliability and flexibility.
• Decentralized Energy Systems: Decentralized energy systems, such as community microgrids and distributed energy resources, will likely become more prevalent. These systems empower communities to generate, store, and manage their energy locally, promoting resilience and energy independence.
• Circular Economy in Energy: The adoption of circular economy principles in the energy sector will gain traction, emphasizing resource efficiency, recycling, and waste reduction. This strategy seeks to mitigate the harmful consequences of energy production and consumption on nature.
• Policy and Regulatory Shifts: Governments worldwide are expected to implement more ambitious policies and regulations to accelerate the transition to renewable energy. Carbon pricing, renewable energy mandates, and incentives for sustainable practices will shape the regulatory environment.
• Global Collaboration: International cooperation and collaboration will be crucial for addressing global energy challenges. Shared research initiatives, technology transfer, and joint efforts to combat climate change will foster a collective approach to building a sustainable energy future.

The global shift towards renewable energy is pivotal in fostering a sustainable future. The imperative to mitigate climate change, ensure energy security, and promote economic prosperity underscores the significance of embracing clean technologies. The trajectory towards a low-carbon energy landscape becomes increasingly tangible as nations unite in initiatives like the Paris Agreement and implement robust policies. The successes of case studies from Germany to China demonstrate the feasibility and benefits of renewable energy adoption. By continuing to innovate, invest, and collaborate, humanity can unlock the full potential of renewable sources, ensuring a resilient and environmentally responsible energy paradigm for generations to come.

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• ENVIRONMENT

Renewable energy, explained

Solar, wind, hydroelectric, biomass, and geothermal power can provide energy without the planet-warming effects of fossil fuels.

In any discussion about climate change , renewable energy usually tops the list of changes the world can implement to stave off the worst effects of rising temperatures. That's because renewable energy sources such as solar and wind don't emit carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases that contribute to global warming .

Clean energy has far more to recommend it than just being "green." The growing sector creates jobs , makes electric grids more resilient, expands energy access in developing countries, and helps lower energy bills. All of those factors have contributed to a renewable energy renaissance in recent years, with wind and solar setting new records for electricity generation .

For the past 150 years or so, humans have relied heavily on coal, oil, and other fossil fuels to power everything from light bulbs to cars to factories. Fossil fuels are embedded in nearly everything we do, and as a result, the greenhouse gases released from the burning of those fuels have reached historically high levels .

As greenhouse gases trap heat in the atmosphere that would otherwise escape into space, average temperatures on the surface are rising . Global warming is one symptom of climate change, the term scientists now prefer to describe the complex shifts affecting our planet’s weather and climate systems. Climate change encompasses not only rising average temperatures but also extreme weather events, shifting wildlife populations and habitats, rising seas , and a range of other impacts .

Of course, renewables—like any source of energy—have their own trade-offs and associated debates. One of them centers on the definition of renewable energy. Strictly speaking, renewable energy is just what you might think: perpetually available, or as the U.S. Energy Information Administration puts it, " virtually inexhaustible ." But "renewable" doesn't necessarily mean sustainable, as opponents of corn-based ethanol or large hydropower dams often argue. It also doesn't encompass other low- or zero-emissions resources that have their own advocates, including energy efficiency and nuclear power.

Types of renewable energy sources

Hydropower: For centuries, people have harnessed the energy of river currents, using dams to control water flow. Hydropower is the world's biggest source of renewable energy by far, with China, Brazil, Canada, the U.S., and Russia the leading hydropower producers . While hydropower is theoretically a clean energy source replenished by rain and snow, it also has several drawbacks.

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Large dams can disrupt river ecosystems and surrounding communities , harming wildlife and displacing residents. Hydropower generation is vulnerable to silt buildup, which can compromise capacity and harm equipment. Drought can also cause problems. In the western U.S., carbon dioxide emissions over a 15-year period were 100 megatons higher than they normally would have been, according to a 2018 study , as utilities turned to coal and gas to replace hydropower lost to drought. Even hydropower at full capacity bears its own emissions problems, as decaying organic material in reservoirs releases methane.

Dams aren't the only way to use water for power: Tidal and wave energy projects around the world aim to capture the ocean's natural rhythms. Marine energy projects currently generate an estimated 500 megawatts of power —less than one percent of all renewables—but the potential is far greater. Programs like Scotland’s Saltire Prize have encouraged innovation in this area.

Wind: Harnessing the wind as a source of energy started more than 7,000 years ago . Now, electricity-generating wind turbines are proliferating around the globe, and China, the U.S., and Germany are the leading wind energy producers. From 2001 to 2017 , cumulative wind capacity around the world increased to more than 539,000 megawatts from 23,900 mw—more than 22 fold.

Some people may object to how wind turbines look on the horizon and to how they sound, but wind energy, whose prices are declining , is proving too valuable a resource to deny. While most wind power comes from onshore turbines, offshore projects are appearing too, with the most in the U.K. and Germany. The first U.S. offshore wind farm opened in 2016 in Rhode Island, and other offshore projects are gaining momentum . Another problem with wind turbines is that they’re a danger for birds and bats, killing hundreds of thousands annually , not as many as from glass collisions and other threats like habitat loss and invasive species, but enough that engineers are working on solutions to make them safer for flying wildlife.

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Solar: From home rooftops to utility-scale farms, solar power is reshaping energy markets around the world. In the decade from 2007 and 2017 the world's total installed energy capacity from photovoltaic panels increased a whopping 4,300 percent .

In addition to solar panels, which convert the sun's light to electricity, concentrating solar power (CSP) plants use mirrors to concentrate the sun's heat, deriving thermal energy instead. China, Japan, and the U.S. are leading the solar transformation, but solar still has a long way to go, accounting for around two percent of the total electricity generated in the U.S. in 2017. Solar thermal energy is also being used worldwide for hot water, heating, and cooling.

Biomass: Biomass energy includes biofuels such as ethanol and biodiesel , wood and wood waste, biogas from landfills, and municipal solid waste. Like solar power, biomass is a flexible energy source, able to fuel vehicles, heat buildings, and produce electricity. But biomass can raise thorny issues.

Critics of corn-based ethanol , for example, say it competes with the food market for corn and supports the same harmful agricultural practices that have led to toxic algae blooms and other environmental hazards. Similarly, debates have erupted over whether it's a good idea to ship wood pellets from U.S. forests over to Europe so that it can be burned for electricity. Meanwhile, scientists and companies are working on ways to more efficiently convert corn stover , wastewater sludge , and other biomass sources into energy, aiming to extract value from material that would otherwise go to waste.

Geothermal: Used for thousands of years in some countries for cooking and heating, geothermal energy is derived from the Earth’s internal heat . On a large scale, underground reservoirs of steam and hot water can be tapped through wells that can go a mile deep or more to generate electricity. On a smaller scale, some buildings have geothermal heat pumps that use temperature differences several feet below ground for heating and cooling. Unlike solar and wind energy, geothermal energy is always available, but it has side effects that need to be managed, such as the rotten egg smell that can accompany released hydrogen sulfide.

Ways to boost renewable energy

Cities, states, and federal governments around the world are instituting policies aimed at increasing renewable energy. At least 29 U.S. states have set renewable portfolio standards —policies that mandate a certain percentage of energy from renewable sources, More than 100 cities worldwide now boast at least 70 percent renewable energy, and still others are making commitments to reach 100 percent . Other policies that could encourage renewable energy growth include carbon pricing, fuel economy standards, and building efficiency standards. Corporations are making a difference too, purchasing record amounts of renewable power in 2018.

Wonder whether your state could ever be powered by 100 percent renewables? No matter where you live, scientist Mark Jacobson believes it's possible. That vision is laid out here , and while his analysis is not without critics , it punctuates a reality with which the world must now reckon. Even without climate change, fossil fuels are a finite resource, and if we want our lease on the planet to be renewed, our energy will have to be renewable.

Related Topics

• SUSTAINABILITY
• RENEWABLE ENERGY
• GEOTHERMAL ENERGY
• SOLAR POWER
• HYDROELECTRIC POWER
• CLIMATE CHANGE

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May 1, 2006

11 min read

The Rise of Renewable Energy

Solar cells, wind turbines and biofuels are poised to become major energy sources. New policies could dramatically accelerate that evolution

By Daniel M. Kammen

No plan to substantially reduce greenhouse gas emissions can succeed through increases in energy efficiency alone. Because economic growth continues to boost the demand for energy-- more coal for powering new factories, more oil for fueling new cars, more natural gas for heating new homes--carbon emissions will keep climbing despite the introduction of more energy-efficient vehicles, buildings and appliances. To counter the alarming trend of global warming, the U.S. and other countries must make a major commitment to developing renewable energy sources that generate little or no carbon.

Renewable energy technologies were suddenly and briefly fashionable three decades ago in response to the oil embargoes of the 1970s, but the interest and support were not sustained. In recent years, however, dramatic improvements in the performance and affordability of solar cells, wind turbines and biofuels--ethanol and other fuels derived from plants--have paved the way for mass commercialization. In addition to their environmental benefits, renewable sources promise to enhance America's energy security by reducing the country's reliance on fossil fuels from other nations. What is more, high and wildly fluctuating prices for oil and natural gas have made renewable alternatives more appealing.

We are now in an era where the opportunities for renewable energy are unprecedented, making this the ideal time to advance clean power for decades to come. But the endeavor will require a long-term investment of scientific, economic and political resources. Policymakers and ordinary citizens must demand action and challenge one another to hasten the transition.

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Let the Sun Shine

SOLAR CELLS, also known as photovoltaics, use semiconductor materials to convert sunlight into electric current. They now provide just a tiny slice of the world's electricity: their global generating capacity of 5,000 megawatts (MW) is only 0.15 percent of the total generating capacity from all sources. Yet sunlight could potentially supply 5,000 times as much energy as the world currently consumes. And thanks to technology improvements, cost declines and favorable policies in many states and nations, the annual production of photovoltaics has increased by more than 25 percent a year for the past decade and by a remarkable 45 percent in 2005. The cells manufactured last year added 1,727 MW to worldwide generating capacity, with 833 MW made in Japan, 353 MW in Germany and 153 MW in the U.S.

Solar cells can now be made from a range of materials, from the traditional multicrystalline silicon wafers that still dominate the market to thin-film silicon cells and devices composed of plastic or organic semiconductors. Thin-film photovoltaics are cheaper to produce than crystalline silicon cells but are also less efficient at turning light into power. In laboratory tests, crystalline cells have achieved efficiencies of 30 percent or more; current commercial cells of this type range from 15 to 20 percent. Both laboratory and commercial efficiencies for all kinds of solar cells have risen steadily in recent years, indicating that an expansion of research efforts would further enhance the performance of solar cells on the market.

Solar photovoltaics are particularly easy to use because they can be installed in so many places--on the roofs or walls of homes and office buildings, in vast arrays in the desert, even sewn into clothing to power portable electronic devices. The state of California has joined Japan and Germany in leading a global push for solar installations; the Million Solar Roof commitment is intended to create 3,000 MW of new generating capacity in the state by 2018. Studies done by my research group, the Renewable and Appropriate Energy Laboratory at the University of California, Berkeley, show that annual production of solar photovoltaics in the U.S. alone could grow to 10,000 MW in just 20 years if current trends continue.

Blowing in the Wind

WIND POWER has been growing at a pace rivaling that of the solar industry. The worldwide generating capacity of wind turbines has increased more than 25 percent a year, on average, for the past decade, reaching nearly 60,000 MW in 2005. The growth has been nothing short of explosive in Europe-- between 1994 and 2005, the installed wind power capacity in European Union nations jumped from 1,700 to 40,000 MW. Germany alone has more than 18,000 MW of capacity thanks to an aggressive construction program. The northern German state of Schleswig-Holstein currently meets one quarter of its annual electricity demand with more than 2,400 wind turbines, and in certain months wind power provides more than half the state's electricity. In addition, Spain has 10,000 MW of wind capacity, Denmark has 3,000 MW, and Great Britain, the Netherlands, Italy and Portugal each have more than 1,000 MW.

In the U.S. the wind power industry has accelerated dramatically in the past five years, with total generating capacity leaping 36 percent to 9,100 MW in 2005. Although wind turbines now produce only 0.5 percent of the nation's electricity, the potential for expansion is enormous, especially in the windy Great Plains states. (North Dakota, for example, has greater wind energy resources than Germany, but only 98 MW of generating capacity is installed there.) If the U.S. constructed enough wind farms to fully tap these resources, the turbines could generate as much as 11 trillion kilowatt-hours of electricity, or nearly three times the total amount produced from all energy sources in the nation last year. The wind industry has developed increasingly large and efficient turbines, each capable of yielding 4 to 6 MW. And in many locations, wind power is the cheapest form of new electricity, with costs ranging from four to seven cents per kilowatt-hour.

The growth of new wind farms in the U.S. has been spurred by a production tax credit that provides a modest subsidy equivalent to 1.9 cents per kilowatt-hour, enabling wind turbines to compete with coal-fired plants. Unfortunately, Congress has repeatedly threatened to eliminate the tax credit. Instead of instituting a long-term subsidy for wind power, the lawmakers have extended the tax credit on a year-to-year basis, and the continual uncertainty has slowed investment in wind farms. Congress is also threatening to derail a proposed 130-turbine farm off the coast of Massachusetts that would provide 468 MW of generating capacity, enough to power most of Cape Cod, Martha's Vineyard and Nantucket.

The reservations about wind power come partly from utility companies that are reluctant to embrace the new technology and partly from so-called NIMBY-ism. (NIMBY is an acronym for Not in My Backyard.) Although local concerns over how wind turbines will affect landscape views may have some merit, they must be balanced against the social costs of the alternatives. Because society's energy needs are growing relentlessly, rejecting wind farms often means requiring the construction or expansion of fossil fuel-burning power plants that will have far more devastating environmental effects.

Green Fuels

RESEARCHERS ARE ALSO pressing ahead with the development of biofuels that could replace at least a portion of the oil currently consumed by motor vehicles. The most common biofuel by far in the U.S. is ethanol, which is typically made from corn and blended with gasoline. The manufacturers of ethanol benefit from a substantial tax credit: with the help of the 2-billion annual subsidy, they sold more than 16 billion liters of ethanol in 2005 (almost 3 percent of all automobile fuel by volume), and production is expected to rise 50 percent by 2007. Some policymakers have questioned the wisdom of the subsidy, pointing to studies showing that it takes more energy to harvest the corn and refine the ethanol than the fuel can deliver to combustion engines. In a recent analysis, though, my colleagues and I discovered that some of these studies did not properly account for the energy content of the by-products manufactured along with the ethanol. When all the inputs and outputs were correctly factored in, we found that ethanol has a positive net energy of almost five megajoules per liter.

We also found, however, that ethanol's impact on greenhouse gas emissions is more ambiguous. Our best estimates indicate that substituting cornbased ethanol for gasoline reduces greenhouse gas emissions by 18 percent, but the analysis is hampered by large uncertainties regarding certain agricultural practices, particularly the environmental costs of fertilizers. If we use different assumptions about these practices, the results of switching to ethanol range from a 36 percent drop in emissions to a 29 percent increase. Although corn-based ethanol may help the U.S. reduce its reliance on foreign oil, it will probably not do much to slow global warming unless the production of the biofuel becomes cleaner.

But the calculations change substantially when the ethanol is made from cellulosic sources: woody plants such as switchgrass or poplar. Whereas most makers of corn-based ethanol burn fossil fuels to provide the heat for fermentation, the producers of cellulosic ethanol burn lignin--an unfermentable part of the organic material--to heat the plant sugars. Burning lignin does not add any greenhouse gases to the atmosphere, because the emissions are offset by the carbon dioxide absorbed during the growth of the plants used to make the ethanol. As a result, substituting cellulosic ethanol for gasoline can slash greenhouse gas emissions by 90 percent or more.

Another promising biofuel is socalled green diesel. Researchers have produced this fuel by first gasifying biomass-- heating organic materials enough that they release hydrogen and carbon monoxide--and then converting these compounds into long-chain hydrocarbons using the Fischer-Tropsch process. (During World War II, German engineers employed these chemical reactions to make synthetic motor fuels out of coal.) The result would be an economically competitive liquid fuel for motor vehicles that would add virtually no greenhouse gases to the atmosphere. Oil giant Royal Dutch/Shell is currently investigating the technology.

The Need for R&D

EACH OF THESE renewable sources is now at or near a tipping point, the crucial stage when investment and innovation, as well as market access, could enable these attractive but generally marginal providers to become major contributors to regional and global energy supplies. At the same time, aggressive policies designed to open markets for renewables are taking hold at city, state and federal levels around the world. Governments have adopted these policies for a wide variety of reasons: to promote market diversity or energy security, to bolster industries and jobs, and to protect the environment on both the local and global scales. In the U.S. more than 20 states have adopted standards setting a minimum for the fraction of electricity that must be supplied with renewable sources. Germany plans to generate 20 percent of its electricity from renewables by 2020, and Sweden intends to give up fossil fuels entirely.

Even President George W. Bush said, in his now famous State of the Union address this past January, that the U.S. is addicted to oil. And although Bush did not make the link to global warming, nearly all scientists agree that humanity's addiction to fossil fuels is disrupting the earth's climate. The time for action is now, and at last the tools exist to alter energy production and consumption in ways that simultaneously benefit the economy and the environment. Over the past 25 years, however, the public and private funding of research and development in the energy sector has withered. Between 1980 and 2005 the fraction of all U.S. R&D spending devoted to energy declined from 10 to 2 percent. Annual public R&D funding for energy sank from 8 billion to 3 billion (in 2002 dollars); private R&D plummeted from 4 billion to 1 billion [ see box on next page ].

To put these declines in perspective, consider that in the early 1980s energy companies were investing more in R&D than were drug companies, whereas today investment by energy firms is an order of magnitude lower. Total private R&D funding for the entire energy sector is less than that of a single large biotech company. (Amgen, for example, had R&D expenses of 2.3 billion in 2005.) And as R&D spending dwindles, so does innovation. For instance, as R&D funding for photovoltaics and wind power has slipped over the past quarter of a century, the number of successful patent applications in these fields has fallen accordingly. The lack of attention to long-term research and planning has significantly weakened our nation's ability to respond to the challenges of climate change and disruptions in energy supplies.

Calls for major new commitments to energy R&D have become common. A 1997 study by the President's Committee of Advisors on Science and Technology and a 2004 report by the bipartisan National Commission on Energy Policy both recommended that the federal government double its R&D spending on energy. But would such an expansion be enough? Probably not. Based on assessments of the cost to stabilize the amount of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere and other studies that estimate the success of energy R&D programs and the resulting savings from the technologies that would emerge, my research group has calculated that public funding of 15 billion to 30 billion a year would be required--a fivefold to 10-fold increase over current levels.

Greg F. Nemet, a doctoral student in my laboratory, and I found that an increase of this magnitude would be roughly comparable to those that occurred during previous federal R&D initiatives such as the Manhattan Project and the Apollo program, each of which produced demonstrable economic benefits in addition to meeting its objectives. American energy companies could also boost their R&D spending by a factor of 10, and it would still be below the average for U.S. industry overall. Although government funding is essential to supporting early-stage technologies, private-sector R&D is the key to winnowing the best ideas and reducing the barriers to commercialization.

Raising R&D spending, though, is not the only way to make clean energy a national priority. Educators at all grade levels, from kindergarten to college, can stimulate public interest and activism by teaching how energy use and production affect the social and natural environment. Nonprofit organizations can establish a series of contests that would reward the first company or private group to achieve a challenging and worthwhile energy goal, such as constructing a building or appliance that can generate its own power or developing a commercial vehicle that can go 200 miles on a single gallon of fuel. The contests could be modeled after the Ashoka awards for pioneers in public policy and the Ansari X Prize for the developers of space vehicles. Scientists and entrepreneurs should also focus on finding clean, affordable ways to meet the energy needs of people in the developing world. My colleagues and I, for instance, recently detailed the environmental benefits of improving cooking stoves in Africa.

But perhaps the most important step toward creating a sustainable energy economy is to institute market-based schemes to make the prices of carbon fuels reflect their social cost. The use of coal, oil and natural gas imposes a huge collective toll on society, in the form of health care expenditures for ailments caused by air pollution, military spending to secure oil supplies, environmental damage from mining operations, and the potentially devastating economic impacts of global warming. A fee on carbon emissions would provide a simple, logical and transparent method to reward renewable, clean energy sources over those that harm the economy and the environment. The tax revenues could pay for some of the social costs of carbon emissions, and a portion could be designated to compensate low-income families who spend a larger share of their income on energy. Furthermore, the carbon fee could be combined with a cap-and-trade program that would set limits on carbon emissions but also allow the cleanest energy suppliers to sell permits to their dirtier competitors. The federal government has used such programs with great success to curb other pollutants, and several northeastern states are already experimenting with greenhouse gas emissions trading.

Best of all, these steps would give energy companies an enormous financial incentive to advance the development and commercialization of renewable energy sources. In essence, the U.S. has the opportunity to foster an entirely new industry. The threat of climate change can be a rallying cry for a clean-technology revolution that would strengthen the country's manufacturing base, create thousands of jobs and alleviate our international trade deficits--instead of importing foreign oil, we can export high-efficiency vehicles, appliances, wind turbines and photovoltaics. This transformation can turn the nation's energy sector into something that was once deemed impossible: a vibrant, environmentally sustainable engine of growth.

DANIEL M. KAMMEN is Class of 1935 Distinguished Professor of Energy at the University of California, Berkeley, where he holds appointments in the Energy and Resources Group, the Goldman School of Public Policy and the department of nuclear engineering. He is founding director of the Renewable and Appropriate Energy Laboratory and co-director of the Berkeley Institute of the Environment.

Renewable Energy Explained

Solar, wind, hydroelectric, biomass, and geothermal power can provide energy without the planet-warming effects of fossil fuels.

Chemistry, Conservation, Earth Science, Engineering

Braes of Doune Wind Farm

As of 2017, wind turbines, like the Braes of Doune wind farm near Stirling, Scotland, are now producing 539,000 megawatts of power around the world—22 times more than 16 years before. Unfortunately, this renewable, clean energy generator isn't perfect.

Photograph by Jim Richardson

In any discussion about climate change , renewable energy usually tops the list of changes the world can implement to stave off the worst effects of rising temperatures. That's because renewable energy sources, such as solar and wind, don't emit carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases that contribute to global warming. Clean energy has far more to recommend it than just being "green." The growing sector creates jobs, makes electric grids more resilient, expands energy access in developing countries, and helps lower energy bills. All of those factors have contributed to a renewable energy renaissance in recent years, with wind and solar setting new records for electricity generation. For the past 150 years or so, humans have relied heavily on coal, oil, and other fossil fuels to power everything from light bulbs to cars to factories. Fossil fuels are embedded in nearly everything we do, and as a result, the greenhouse gases released from the burning of those fuels have reached historically high levels. As greenhouse gases trap heat in the atmosphere that would otherwise escape into space, average temperatures on the surface are rising. Global warming is one symptom of climate change, the term scientists now prefer to describe the complex shifts affecting our planet’s weather and climate systems. Climate change encompasses not only rising average temperatures but also extreme weather events, shifting wildlife populations and habitats, rising seas, and a range of other impacts. Of course, renewables—like any source of energy—have their own trade-offs and associated debates. One of them centers on the definition of renewable energy. Strictly speaking, renewable energy is just what you might think: perpetually available, or as the United States Energy Information Administration puts it, "virtually inexhaustible." But "renewable" doesn't necessarily mean sustainable, as opponents of corn-based ethanol or large hydropower dams often argue. It also doesn't encompass other low- or zero-emissions resources that have their own advocates, including energy efficiency and nuclear power. Types of Renewable Energy Sources Hydropower: For centuries, people have harnessed the energy of river currents, using dams to control water flow. Hydropower is the world's biggest source of renewable energy by far, with China, Brazil, Canada, the U.S., and Russia being the leading hydropower producers. While hydropower is theoretically a clean energy source replenished by rain and snow, it also has several drawbacks. Large dams can disrupt river ecosystems and surrounding communities, harming wildlife, and displacing residents. Hydropower generation is vulnerable to silt buildup, which can compromise capacity and harm equipment. Drought can also cause problems. In the western U.S., carbon dioxide emissions over a 15-year period were 100 megatons higher than they would have been with normal precipitation levels, according to a 2018 study, as utilities turned to coal and gas to replace hydropower lost to drought. Even hydropower at full capacity bears its own emissions problems, as decaying organic material in reservoirs releases methane. Dams aren't the only way to use water for power: Tidal and wave energy projects around the world aim to capture the ocean's natural rhythms. Marine energy projects currently generate an estimated 500 megawatts of power—less than one percent of all renewables—but the potential is far greater. Programs like Scotland’s Saltire Prize have encouraged innovation in this area. Wind: Harnessing the wind as a source of energy started more than 7,000 years ago. Now, electricity-generating wind turbines are proliferating around the globe, and China, the U.S., and Germany are the world's leading wind-energy producers. From 2001 to 2017, cumulative wind capacity around the world increased to more than 539,000 megawatts from 23,900 megawatts—more than 22 fold. Some people may object to how wind turbines look on the horizon and to how they sound, but wind energy, whose prices are declining, is proving too valuable a resource to deny. While most wind power comes from onshore turbines, offshore projects are appearing too, with the most in the United Kingdom and Germany. The first U.S. offshore wind farm opened in 2016 in Rhode Island, and other offshore projects are gaining momentum. Another problem with wind turbines is that they’re a danger for birds and bats, killing hundreds of thousands annually, not as many as from glass collisions and other threats like habitat loss and invasive species, but enough that engineers are working on solutions to make them safer for flying wildlife. Solar: From home rooftops to utility-scale farms, solar power is reshaping energy markets around the world. In the decade from 2007 and 2017 the world's total installed energy capacity from photovoltaic panels increased a whopping 4,300 percent. In addition to solar panels, which convert the sun's light to electricity, concentrating solar power (CSP) plants use mirrors to concentrate the sun's heat, deriving thermal energy instead. China, Japan, and the U.S. are leading the solar transformation, but solar still has a long way to go, accounting for around just two percent of the total electricity generated in the U.S. in 2017. Solar thermal energy is also being used worldwide for hot water, heating, and cooling. Biomass: Biomass energy includes biofuels, such as ethanol and biodiesel, wood, wood waste, biogas from landfills, and municipal solid waste. Like solar power, biomass is a flexible energy source, able to fuel vehicles, heat buildings, and produce electricity. But biomass can raise thorny issues. Critics of corn-based ethanol, for example, say it competes with the food market for corn and supports the same harmful agricultural practices that have led to toxic algae blooms and other environmental hazards. Similarly, debates have erupted over whether it's a good idea to ship wood pellets from U.S. forests over to Europe so that it can be burned for electricity. Meanwhile, scientists and companies are working on ways to more efficiently convert corn stover, wastewater sludge, and other biomass sources into energy, aiming to extract value from material that would otherwise go to waste. Geothermal: Used for thousands of years in some countries for cooking and heating, geothermal energy is derived from Earth’s internal heat. On a large scale, underground reservoirs of steam and hot water can be tapped through wells that can go a two kilometers deep or more to generate electricity. On a smaller scale, some buildings have geothermal heat pumps that use temperature differences several meters below ground for heating and cooling. Unlike solar and wind energy, geothermal energy is always available, but it has side effects that need to be managed, such as the rotten-egg smell that can accompany released hydrogen sulfide. Ways To Boost Renewable Energy Cities, states, and federal governments around the world are instituting policies aimed at increasing renewable energy. At least 29 U.S. states have set renewable portfolio standards—policies that mandate a certain percentage of energy from renewable sources. More than 100 cities worldwide now boast receiving at least 70 percent of their energy from renewable sources, and still others are making commitments to reach 100 percent. Other policies that could encourage renewable energy growth include carbon pricing, fuel economy standards, and building efficiency standards. Corporations are making a difference too, purchasing record amounts of renewable power in 2018. Wonder whether your state could ever be powered by 100 percent renewables? No matter where you live, scientist Mark Jacobson believes it's possible. That vision is laid out here , and while his analysis is not without critics , it punctuates a reality with which the world must now reckon. Even without climate change, fossil fuels are a finite resource, and if we want our lease on the planet to be renewed, our energy will have to be renewable.

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Related Resources

• Open access
• Published: 07 January 2020

Renewable energy for sustainable development in India: current status, future prospects, challenges, employment, and investment opportunities

• Charles Rajesh Kumar. J   ORCID: orcid.org/0000-0003-2354-6463 1 &
• M. A. Majid 1  

Energy, Sustainability and Society volume  10 , Article number:  2 ( 2020 ) Cite this article

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The primary objective for deploying renewable energy in India is to advance economic development, improve energy security, improve access to energy, and mitigate climate change. Sustainable development is possible by use of sustainable energy and by ensuring access to affordable, reliable, sustainable, and modern energy for citizens. Strong government support and the increasingly opportune economic situation have pushed India to be one of the top leaders in the world’s most attractive renewable energy markets. The government has designed policies, programs, and a liberal environment to attract foreign investments to ramp up the country in the renewable energy market at a rapid rate. It is anticipated that the renewable energy sector can create a large number of domestic jobs over the following years. This paper aims to present significant achievements, prospects, projections, generation of electricity, as well as challenges and investment and employment opportunities due to the development of renewable energy in India. In this review, we have identified the various obstacles faced by the renewable sector. The recommendations based on the review outcomes will provide useful information for policymakers, innovators, project developers, investors, industries, associated stakeholders and departments, researchers, and scientists.

Introduction

The sources of electricity production such as coal, oil, and natural gas have contributed to one-third of global greenhouse gas emissions. It is essential to raise the standard of living by providing cleaner and more reliable electricity [ 1 ]. India has an increasing energy demand to fulfill the economic development plans that are being implemented. The provision of increasing quanta of energy is a vital pre-requisite for the economic growth of a country [ 2 ]. The National Electricity Plan [NEP] [ 3 ] framed by the Ministry of Power (MoP) has developed a 10-year detailed action plan with the objective to provide electricity across the country, and has prepared a further plan to ensure that power is supplied to the citizens efficiently and at a reasonable cost. According to the World Resource Institute Report 2017 [ 4 , 5 ], India is responsible for nearly 6.65% of total global carbon emissions, ranked fourth next to China (26.83%), the USA (14.36%), and the EU (9.66%). Climate change might also change the ecological balance in the world. Intended Nationally Determined Contributions (INDCs) have been submitted to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) and the Paris Agreement. The latter has hoped to achieve the goal of limiting the rise in global temperature to well below 2 °C [ 6 , 7 ]. According to a World Energy Council [ 8 ] prediction, global electricity demand will peak in 2030. India is one of the largest coal consumers in the world and imports costly fossil fuel [ 8 ]. Close to 74% of the energy demand is supplied by coal and oil. According to a report from the Center for monitoring Indian economy, the country imported 171 million tons of coal in 2013–2014, 215 million tons in 2014–2015, 207 million tons in 2015–2016, 195 million tons in 2016–2017, and 213 million tons in 2017–2018 [ 9 ]. Therefore, there is an urgent need to find alternate sources for generating electricity.

In this way, the country will have a rapid and global transition to renewable energy technologies to achieve sustainable growth and avoid catastrophic climate change. Renewable energy sources play a vital role in securing sustainable energy with lower emissions [ 10 ]. It is already accepted that renewable energy technologies might significantly cover the electricity demand and reduce emissions. In recent years, the country has developed a sustainable path for its energy supply. Awareness of saving energy has been promoted among citizens to increase the use of solar, wind, biomass, waste, and hydropower energies. It is evident that clean energy is less harmful and often cheaper. India is aiming to attain 175 GW of renewable energy which would consist of 100 GW from solar energy, 10 GW from bio-power, 60 GW from wind power, and 5 GW from small hydropower plants by the year 2022 [ 11 ]. Investors have promised to achieve more than 270 GW, which is significantly above the ambitious targets. The promises are as follows: 58 GW by foreign companies, 191 GW by private companies, 18 GW by private sectors, and 5 GW by the Indian Railways [ 12 ]. Recent estimates show that in 2047, solar potential will be more than 750 GW and wind potential will be 410 GW [ 13 , 14 ]. To reach the ambitious targets of generating 175 GW of renewable energy by 2022, it is essential that the government creates 330,000 new jobs and livelihood opportunities [ 15 , 16 ].

A mixture of push policies and pull mechanisms, accompanied by particular strategies should promote the development of renewable energy technologies. Advancement in technology, proper regulatory policies [ 17 ], tax deduction, and attempts in efficiency enhancement due to research and development (R&D) [ 18 ] are some of the pathways to conservation of energy and environment that should guarantee that renewable resource bases are used in a cost-effective and quick manner. Hence, strategies to promote investment opportunities in the renewable energy sector along with jobs for the unskilled workers, technicians, and contractors are discussed. This article also manifests technological and financial initiatives [ 19 ], policy and regulatory framework, as well as training and educational initiatives [ 20 , 21 ] launched by the government for the growth and development of renewable energy sources. The development of renewable technology has encountered explicit obstacles, and thus, there is a need to discuss these barriers. Additionally, it is also vital to discover possible solutions to overcome these barriers, and hence, proper recommendations have been suggested for the steady growth of renewable power [ 22 , 23 , 24 ]. Given the enormous potential of renewables in the country, coherent policy measures and an investor-friendly administration might be the key drivers for India to become a global leader in clean and green energy.

Projection of global primary energy consumption

An energy source is a necessary element of socio-economic development. The increasing economic growth of developing nations in the last decades has caused an accelerated increase in energy consumption. This trend is anticipated to grow [ 25 ]. A prediction of future power consumption is essential for the investigation of adequate environmental and economic policies [ 26 ]. Likewise, an outlook to future power consumption helps to determine future investments in renewable energy. Energy supply and security have not only increased the essential issues for the development of human society but also for their global political and economic patterns [ 27 ]. Hence, international comparisons are helpful to identify past, present, and future power consumption.

Table 1 shows the primary energy consumption of the world, based on the BP Energy Outlook 2018 reports. In 2016, India’s overall energy consumption was 724 million tons of oil equivalent (Mtoe) and is expected to rise to 1921 Mtoe by 2040 with an average growth rate of 4.2% per annum. Energy consumption of various major countries comprises commercially traded fuels and modern renewables used to produce power. In 2016, India was the fourth largest energy consumer in the world after China, the USA, and the Organization for economic co-operation and development (OECD) in Europe [ 29 ].

The projected estimation of global energy consumption demonstrates that energy consumption in India is continuously increasing and retains its position even in 2035/2040 [ 28 ]. The increase in India’s energy consumption will push the country’s share of global energy demand to 11% by 2040 from 5% in 2016. Emerging economies such as China, India, or Brazil have experienced a process of rapid industrialization, have increased their share in the global economy, and are exporting enormous volumes of manufactured products to developed countries. This shift of economic activities among nations has also had consequences concerning the country’s energy use [ 30 ].

Projected primary energy consumption in India

The size and growth of a country’s population significantly affects the demand for energy. With 1.368 billion citizens, India is ranked second, of the most populous countries as of January 2019 [ 31 ]. The yearly growth rate is 1.18% and represents almost 17.74% of the world’s population. The country is expected to have more than 1.383 billion, 1.512 billion, 1.605 billion, 1.658 billion people by the end of 2020, 2030, 2040, and 2050, respectively. Each year, India adds a higher number of people to the world than any other nation and the specific population of some of the states in India is equal to the population of many countries.

The growth of India’s energy consumption will be the fastest among all significant economies by 2040, with coal meeting most of this demand followed by renewable energy. Renewables became the second most significant source of domestic power production, overtaking gas and then oil, by 2020. The demand for renewables in India will have a tremendous growth of 256 Mtoe in 2040 from 17 Mtoe in 2016, with an annual increase of 12%, as shown in Table 2 .

Table 3 shows the primary energy consumption of renewables for the BRIC countries (Brazil, Russia, India, and China) from 2016 to 2040. India consumed around 17 Mtoe of renewable energy in 2016, and this will be 256 Mtoe in 2040. It is probable that India’s energy consumption will grow fastest among all major economies by 2040, with coal contributing most in meeting this demand followed by renewables. The percentage share of renewable consumption in 2016 was 2% and is predicted to increase by 13% by 2040.

How renewable energy sources contribute to the energy demand in India

Even though India has achieved a fast and remarkable economic growth, energy is still scarce. Strong economic growth in India is escalating the demand for energy, and more energy sources are required to cover this demand. At the same time, due to the increasing population and environmental deterioration, the country faces the challenge of sustainable development. The gap between demand and supply of power is expected to rise in the future [ 32 ]. Table 4 presents the power supply status of the country from 2009–2010 to 2018–2019 (until October 2018). In 2018, the energy demand was 1,212,134 GWh, and the availability was 1,203,567 GWh, i.e., a deficit of − 0.7% [ 33 ].

According to the Load generation and Balance Report (2016–2017) of the Central Electricity Authority of India (CEA), the electrical energy demand for 2021–2022 is anticipated to be at least 1915 terawatt hours (TWh), with a peak electric demand of 298 GW [ 34 ]. Increasing urbanization and rising income levels are responsible for an increased demand for electrical appliances, i.e., an increased demand for electricity in the residential sector. The increased demand in materials for buildings, transportation, capital goods, and infrastructure is driving the industrial demand for electricity. An increased mechanization and the shift to groundwater irrigation across the country is pushing the pumping and tractor demand in the agriculture sector, and hence the large diesel and electricity demand. The penetration of electric vehicles and the fuel switch to electric and induction cook stoves will drive the electricity demand in the other sectors shown in Table 5 .

According to the International Renewable Energy Agency (IRENA), a quarter of India’s energy demand can be met with renewable energy. The country could potentially increase its share of renewable power generation to over one-third by 2030 [ 35 ].

Table 6 presents the estimated contribution of renewable energy sources to the total energy demand. MoP along with CEA in its draft national electricity plan for 2016 anticipated that with 175 GW of installed capacity of renewable power by 2022, the expected electricity generation would be 327 billion units (BUs), which would contribute to 1611 BU energy requirements. This indicates that 20.3% of the energy requirements would be fulfilled by renewable energy by 2022 and 24.2% by 2027 [ 36 ]. Figure 1 shows the ambitious new target for the share of renewable energy in India’s electricity consumption set by MoP. As per the order of revised RPO (Renewable Purchase Obligations, legal act of June 2018), the country has a target of a 21% share of renewable energy in its total electricity consumption by March 2022. In 2014, the same goal was at 15% and increased to 21% by 2018. It is India’s goal to reach 40% renewable sources by 2030.

Target share of renewable energy in India’s power consumption

Estimated renewable energy potential in India

The estimated potential of wind power in the country during 1995 [ 37 ] was found to be 20,000 MW (20 GW), solar energy was 5 × 10 15 kWh/pa, bioenergy was 17,000 MW, bagasse cogeneration was 8000 MW, and small hydropower was 10,000 MW. For 2006, the renewable potential was estimated as 85,000 MW with wind 4500 MW, solar 35 MW, biomass/bioenergy 25,000 MW, and small hydropower of 15,000 MW [ 38 ]. According to the annual report of the Ministry of New and Renewable Energy (MNRE) for 2017–2018, the estimated potential of wind power was 302.251 GW (at 100-m mast height), of small hydropower 19.749 GW, biomass power 17.536 GW, bagasse cogeneration 5 GW, waste to energy (WTE) 2.554 GW, and solar 748.990 GW. The estimated total renewable potential amounted to 1096.080 GW [ 39 ] assuming 3% wasteland, which is shown in Table 7 . India is a tropical country and receives significant radiation, and hence the solar potential is very high [ 40 , 41 , 42 ].

Gross installed capacity of renewable energy in India

As of June 2018 reports, the country intends to reach 225 GW of renewable power capacity by 2022 exceeding the target of 175 GW pledged during the Paris Agreement. The sector is the fourth most attractive renewable energy market in the world. As in October 2018, India ranked fifth in installed renewable energy capacity [ 43 ].

Gross installed capacity of renewable energy—according to region

Table 8 lists the cumulative installed capacity of both conventional and renewable energy sources. The cumulative installed capacity of renewable sources as on the 31 st of December 2018 was 74081.66 MW. Renewable energy (small hydropower, wind, biomass, WTE, solar) accounted for an approximate 21% share of the cumulative installed power capacity, and the remaining 78.791% originated from other conventional sources (coal, gas diesel, nuclear, and large hydropower) [ 44 ]. The best regions for renewable energy are the southern states that have the highest solar irradiance and wind in the country. When renewable energy alone is considered for analysis, the Southern region covers 49.121% of the cumulative installed renewable capacity, followed by the Western region (29.742%), the Northern region (18.890%), the Eastern region (1.836%), the North-Easter region 0.394%, and the Islands (0.017%). As far as conventional energy is concerned, the Western region with 33.452% ranks first and is followed by the Northern region with 28.484%, the Southern region (24.967%), the Eastern region (11.716%), the Northern-Eastern (1.366%), and the Islands (0.015%).

Gross installed capacity of renewable energy—according to ownership

State government, central government, and private players drive the Indian energy sector. The private sector leads the way in renewable energy investment. Table 9 shows the installed gross renewable energy and conventional energy capacity (percentage)—ownership wise. It is evident from Fig. 2 that 95% of the installed renewable capacity derives from private companies, 2% from the central government, and 3% from the state government. The top private companies in the field of non-conventional energy generation are Tata Power Solar, Suzlon, and ReNew Power. Tata Power Solar System Limited are the most significant integrated solar power players in the country, Suzlon realizes wind energy projects, and ReNew Power Ventures operate with solar and wind power.

Gross renewable energy installed capacity (percentage)—Ownership wise as per the 31.12.2018 [ 43 ]

Gross installed capacity of renewable energy—state wise

Table 10 shows the installed capacity of cumulative renewable energy (state wise), out of the total installed capacity of 74,081.66 MW, where Karnataka ranks first with 12,953.24 MW (17.485%), Tamilnadu second with 11,934.38 MW (16%), Maharashtra third with 9283.78 MW (12.532%), Gujarat fourth with 10.641 MW (10.641%), and Rajasthan fifth with 7573.86 MW (10.224%). These five states cover almost 66.991% of the installed capacity of total renewable. Other prominent states are Andhra Pradesh (9.829%), Madhya Pradesh (5.819%), Telangana (5.137%), and Uttar Pradesh (3.879%). These nine states cover almost 91.655%.

Gross installed capacity of renewable energy—according to source

Under union budget of India 2018–2019, INR 3762 crore (USD 581.09 million), was allotted for grid-interactive renewable power schemes and projects. As per the 31.12.2018, the installed capacity of total renewable power (excluding large hydropower) in the country amounted to 74.08166 GW. Around 9.363 GW of solar energy, 1.766 GW of wind, 0.105 GW of small hydropower (SHP), and biomass power of 8.7 GW capacity were added in 2017–2018. Table 11 shows the installed capacity of renewable energy over the last 10 years until the 31.12.2018. Wind energy continues to dominate the countries renewable energy industry, accounting for over 47% of cumulative installed renewable capacity (35,138.15 MW), followed by solar power of 34% (25,212.26 MW), biomass power/cogeneration of 12% (9075.5 MW), and small hydropower of 6% (4517.45 MW). In the renewable energy country attractiveness index (RECAI) of 2018, India ranked in fourth position. The installed renewable energy production capacity has grown at an accelerated pace over the preceding few years, posting a CAGR of 19.78% between 2014 and 2018 [ 45 ] .

Estimation of the installed capacity of renewable energy

Table 12 gives the share of installed cumulative renewable energy capacity, in comparison with the installed conventional energy capacity. In 2022 and 2032, the installed renewable energy capacity will account for 32% and 35%, respectively [ 46 , 47 ]. The most significant renewable capacity expansion program in the world is being taken up by India. The government is preparing to boost the percentage of clean energy through a tremendous push in renewables, as discussed in the subsequent sections.

Gross electricity generation from renewable energy in India

The overall generation (including the generation from grid-connected renewable sources) in the country has grown exponentially. Between 2014–2015 and 2015–2016, it achieved 1110.458 BU and 1173.603 BU, respectively. The same was recorded with 1241.689 BU and 1306.614 BU during 2015–2016 and 1306.614 BU from 2016–2017 and 2017–2018, respectively. Figure 3 indicates that the annual renewable power production increased faster than the conventional power production. The rise accounted for 6.47% in 2015–2016 and 24.88% in 2017–2018, respectively. Table 13 compares the energy generation from traditional sources with that from renewable sources. Remarkably, the energy generation from conventional sources reached 811.143 BU and from renewable sources 9.860 BU in 2010 compared to 1.206.306 BU and 88.945 BU in 2017, respectively [ 48 ]. It is observed that the price of electricity production using renewable technologies is higher than that for conventional generation technologies, but is likely to fall with increasing experience in the techniques involved [ 49 ].

The annual growth in power generation as per the 30th of November 2018

Gross electricity generation from renewable energy—according to regions

Table 14 shows the gross electricity generation from renewable energy-region wise. It is noted that the highest renewable energy generation derives from the southern region, followed by the western part. As of November 2018, 50.33% of energy generation was obtained from the southern area and 29.37%, 18.05%, 2%, and 0.24% from Western, Northern, North-Eastern Areas, and the Island, respectively.

Gross electricity generation from renewable energy—according to states

Table 15 shows the gross electricity generation from renewable energy—region-wise. It is observed that the highest renewable energy generation was achieved from Karnataka (16.57%), Tamilnadu (15.82%), Andhra Pradesh (11.92%), and Gujarat (10.87%) as per November 2018. While adding four years from 2015–2016 to 2018–2019 Tamilnadu [ 50 ] remains in the first position followed by Karnataka, Maharashtra, Gujarat and Andhra Pradesh.

Gross electricity generation from renewable energy—according to sources

Table 16 shows the gross electricity generation from renewable energy—source-wise. It can be concluded from the table that the wind-based energy generation as per 2017–2018 is most prominent with 51.71%, followed by solar energy (25.40%), Bagasse (11.63%), small hydropower (7.55%), biomass (3.34%), and WTE (0.35%). There has been a constant increase in the generation of all renewable sources from 2014–2015 to date. Wind energy, as always, was the highest contributor to the total renewable power production. The percentage of solar energy produced in the overall renewable power production comes next to wind and is typically reduced during the monsoon months. The definite improvement in wind energy production can be associated with a “good” monsoon. Cyclonic action during these months also facilitates high-speed winds. Monsoon winds play a significant part in the uptick in wind power production, especially in the southern states of the country.

Estimation of gross electricity generation from renewable energy

Table 17 shows an estimation of gross electricity generation from renewable energy based on the 2015 report of the National Institution for Transforming India (NITI Aayog) [ 51 ]. It is predicted that the share of renewable power will be 10.2% by 2022, but renewable power technologies contributed a record of 13.4% to the cumulative power production in India as of the 31st of August 2018. The power ministry report shows that India generated 122.10 TWh and out of the total electricity produced, renewables generated 16.30 TWh as on the 31st of August 2018. According to the India Brand Equity Foundation report, it is anticipated that by the year 2040, around 49% of total electricity will be produced using renewable energy.

Current achievements in renewable energy 2017–2018

India cares for the planet and has taken a groundbreaking journey in renewable energy through the last 4 years [ 52 , 53 ]. A dedicated ministry along with financial and technical institutions have helped India in the promotion of renewable energy and diversification of its energy mix. The country is engaged in expanding the use of clean energy sources and has already undertaken several large-scale sustainable energy projects to ensure a massive growth of green energy.

1. India doubled its renewable power capacity in the last 4 years. The cumulative renewable power capacity in 2013–2014 reached 35,500 MW and rose to 70,000 MW in 2017–2018.

2. India stands in the fourth and sixth position regarding the cumulative installed capacity in the wind and solar sector, respectively. Furthermore, its cumulative installed renewable capacity stands in fifth position globally as of the 31st of December 2018.

3. As said above, the cumulative renewable energy capacity target for 2022 is given as 175 GW. For 2017–2018, the cumulative installed capacity amounted to 70 GW, the capacity under implementation is 15 GW and the tendered capacity was 25 GW. The target, the installed capacity, the capacity under implementation, and the tendered capacity are shown in Fig. 4 .

4. There is tremendous growth in solar power. The cumulative installed solar capacity increased by more than eight times in the last 4 years from 2.630 GW (2013–2014) to 22 GW (2017–2018). As of the 31st of December 2018, the installed capacity amounted to 25.2122 GW.

5. The renewable electricity generated in 2017–2018 was 101839 BUs.

6. The country published competitive bidding guidelines for the production of renewable power. It also discovered the lowest tariff and transparent bidding method and resulted in a notable decrease in per unit cost of renewable energy.

7. In 21 states, there are 41 solar parks with a cumulative capacity of more than 26,144 MW that have already been approved by the MNRE. The Kurnool solar park was set up with 1000 MW; and with 2000 MW the largest solar park of Pavagada (Karnataka) is currently under installation.

8. The target for solar power (ground mounted) for 2018–2019 is given as 10 GW, and solar power (Rooftop) as 1 GW.

9. MNRE doubled the target for solar parks (projects of 500 MW or more) from 20 to 40 GW.

10. The cumulative installed capacity of wind power increased by 1.6 times in the last 4 years. In 2013–2014, it amounted to 21 GW, from 2017 to 2018 it amounted to 34 GW, and as of 31st of December 2018, it reached 35.138 GW. This shows that achievements were completed in wind power use.

11. An offshore wind policy was announced. Thirty-four companies (most significant global and domestic wind power players) competed in the “expression of interest” (EoI) floated on the plan to set up India’s first mega offshore wind farm with a capacity of 1 GW.

12. 682 MW small hydropower projects were installed during the last 4 years along with 600 watermills (mechanical applications) and 132 projects still under development.

13. MNRE is implementing green energy corridors to expand the transmission system. 9400 km of green energy corridors are completed or under implementation. The cost spent on it was INR 10141 crore (101,410 Million INR = 1425.01 USD). Furthermore, the total capacity of 19,000 MVA substations is now planned to be complete by March 2020.

14. MNRE is setting up solar pumps (off-grid application), where 90% of pumps have been set up as of today and between 2014–2015 and 2017–2018. Solar street lights were more than doubled. Solar home lighting systems have been improved by around 1.5 times. More than 2,575,000 solar lamps have been distributed to students. The details are illustrated in Fig. 5 .

15. From 2014–2015 to 2017–2018, more than 2.5 lakh (0.25 million) biogas plants were set up for cooking in rural homes to enable families by providing them access to clean fuel.

16. New policy initiatives revised the tariff policy mandating purchase and generation obligations (RPO and RGO). Four wind and solar inter-state transmission were waived; charges were planned, the RPO trajectory for 2022 and renewable energy policy was finalized.

17. Expressions of interest (EoI) were invited for installing solar photovoltaic manufacturing capacities associated with the guaranteed off-take of 20 GW. EoI indicated 10 GW floating solar energy plants.

18. Policy for the solar-wind hybrid was announced. Tender for setting up 2 GW solar-wind hybrid systems in existing projects was invited.

19. To facilitate R&D in renewable power technology, a National lab policy on testing, standardization, and certification was announced by the MNRE.

20. The Surya Mitra program was conducted to train college graduates in the installation, commissioning, operations, and management of solar panels. The International Solar Alliance (ISA) headquarters in India (Gurgaon) will be a new commencement for solar energy improvement in India.

21. The renewable sector has become considerably more attractive for foreign and domestic investors, and the country expects to attract up to USD 80 billion in the next 4 years from 2018–2019 to 2021–2022.

22. The solar power capacity expanded by more than eight times from 2.63 GW in 2013–2014 to 22 GW in 2017–2018.

23. A bidding for 115 GW renewable energy projects up to March 2020 was announced.

24. The Bureau of Indian Standards (BIS) acting for system/components of solar PV was established.

25. To recognize and encourage innovative ideas in renewable energy sectors, the Government provides prizes and awards. Creative ideas/concepts should lead to prototype development. The Name of the award is “Abhinav Soch-Nayi Sambhawanaye,” which means Innovative ideas—New possibilities.

Renewable energy target, installed capacity, under implementation and tendered [ 52 ]

Off-grid solar applications [ 52 ]

Solar energy

Under the National Solar Mission, the MNRE has updated the objective of grid-connected solar power projects from 20 GW by the year 2021–2022 to 100 GW by the year 2021–2022. In 2008–2009, it reached just 6 MW. The “Made in India” initiative to promote domestic manufacturing supported this great height in solar installation capacity. Currently, India has the fifth highest solar installed capacity worldwide. By the 31st of December 2018, solar energy had achieved 25,212.26 MW against the target of 2022, and a further 22.8 GW of capacity has been tendered out or is under current implementation. MNRE is preparing to bid out the remaining solar energy capacity every year for the periods 2018–2019 and 2019–2020 so that bidding may contribute with 100 GW capacity additions by March 2020. In this way, 2 years for the completion of projects would remain. Tariffs will be determined through the competitive bidding process (reverse e-auction) to bring down tariffs significantly. The lowest solar tariff was identified to be INR 2.44 per kWh in July 2018. In 2010, solar tariffs amounted to INR 18 per kWh. Over 100,000 lakh (10,000 million) acres of land had been classified for several planned solar parks, out of which over 75,000 acres had been obtained. As of November 2018, 47 solar parks of a total capacity of 26,694 MW were established. The aggregate capacity of 4195 MW of solar projects has been commissioned inside various solar parks (floating solar power). Table 18 shows the capacity addition compared to the target. It indicates that capacity addition increased exponentially.

Wind energy

As of the 31st of December 2018, the total installed capacity of India amounted to 35,138.15 MW compared to a target of 60 GW by 2022. India is currently in fourth position in the world for installed capacity of wind power. Moreover, around 9.4 GW capacity has been tendered out or is under current implementation. The MNRE is preparing to bid out for A 10 GW wind energy capacity every year for 2018–2019 and 2019–2020, so that bidding will allow for 60 GW capacity additions by March 2020, giving the remaining two years for the accomplishment of the projects. The gross wind energy potential of the country now reaches 302 GW at a 100 m above-ground level. The tariff administration has been changed from feed-in-tariff (FiT) to the bidding method for capacity addition. On the 8th of December 2017, the ministry published guidelines for a tariff-based competitive bidding rule for the acquisition of energy from grid-connected wind energy projects. The developed transparent process of bidding lowered the tariff for wind power to its lowest level ever. The development of the wind industry has risen in a robust ecosystem ensuring project execution abilities and a manufacturing base. State-of-the-art technologies are now available for the production of wind turbines. All the major global players in wind power have their presence in India. More than 12 different companies manufacture more than 24 various models of wind turbines in India. India exports wind turbines and components to the USA, Europe, Australia, Brazil, and other Asian countries. Around 70–80% of the domestic production has been accomplished with strong domestic manufacturing companies. Table 19 lists the capacity addition compared to the target for the capacity addition. Furthermore, electricity generation from the wind-based capacity has improved, even though there was a slowdown of new capacity in the first half of 2018–2019 and 2017–2018.

The national energy storage mission—2018

The country is working toward a National Energy Storage Mission. A draft of the National Energy Storage Mission was proposed in February 2018 and initiated to develop a comprehensive policy and regulatory framework. During the last 4 years, projects included in R&D worth INR 115.8 million (USD 1.66 million) in the domain of energy storage have been launched, and a corpus of INR 48.2 million (USD 0.7 million) has been issued. India’s energy storage mission will provide an opportunity for globally competitive battery manufacturing. By increasing the battery manufacturing expertise and scaling up its national production capacity, the country can make a substantial economic contribution in this crucial sector. The mission aims to identify the cumulative battery requirements, total market size, imports, and domestic manufacturing. Table 20 presents the economic opportunity from battery manufacturing given by the National Institution for Transforming India, also called NITI Aayog, which provides relevant technical advice to central and state governments while designing strategic and long-term policies and programs for the Indian government.

Small hydropower—3-year action agenda—2017

Hydro projects are classified as large hydro, small hydro (2 to 25 MW), micro-hydro (up to 100 kW), and mini-hydropower (100 kW to 2 MW) projects. Whereas the estimated potential of SHP is 20 GW, the 2022 target for India in SHP is 5 GW. As of the 31st of December 2018, the country has achieved 4.5 GW and this production is constantly increasing. The objective, which was planned to be accomplished through infrastructure project grants and tariff support, was included in the NITI Aayog’s 3-year action agenda (2017–2018 to 2019–2020), which was published on the 1st of August 2017. MNRE is providing central financial assistance (CFA) to set up small/micro hydro projects both in the public and private sector. For the identification of new potential locations, surveys and comprehensive project reports are elaborated, and financial support for the renovation and modernization of old projects is provided. The Ministry has established a dedicated completely automatic supervisory control and data acquisition (SCADA)—based on a hydraulic turbine R&D laboratory at the Alternate Hydro Energy Center (AHEC) at IIT Roorkee. The establishment cost for the lab was INR 40 crore (400 million INR, 95.62 Million USD), and the laboratory will serve as a design and validation facility. It investigates hydro turbines and other hydro-mechanical devices adhering to national and international standards [ 54 , 55 ]. Table 21 shows the target and achievements from 2007–2008 to 2018–2019.

National policy regarding biofuels—2018

Modernization has generated an opportunity for a stable change in the use of bioenergy in India. MNRE amended the current policy for biomass in May 2018. The policy presents CFA for projects using biomass such as agriculture-based industrial residues, wood produced through energy plantations, bagasse, crop residues, wood waste generated from industrial operations, and weeds. Under the policy, CFA will be provided to the projects at the rate of INR 2.5 million (USD 35,477.7) per MW for bagasse cogeneration and INR 5 million (USD 70,955.5) per MW for non-bagasse cogeneration. The MNRE also announced a memorandum in November 2018 considering the continuation of the concessional customs duty certificate (CCDC) to set up projects for the production of energy using non-conventional materials such as bio-waste, agricultural, forestry, poultry litter, agro-industrial, industrial, municipal, and urban wastes. The government recently established the National policy on biofuels in August 2018. The MNRE invited an expression of interest (EOI) to estimate the potential of biomass energy and bagasse cogeneration in the country. A program to encourage the promotion of biomass-based cogeneration in sugar mills and other industries was also launched in May 2018. Table 22 shows how the biomass power target and achievements are expected to reach 10 GW of the target of 2022 before the end of 2019.

The new national biogas and organic manure program (NNBOMP)—2018

The National biogas and manure management programme (NBMMP) was launched in 2012–2013. The primary objective was to provide clean gaseous fuel for cooking, where the remaining slurry was organic bio-manure which is rich in nitrogen, phosphorus, and potassium. Further, 47.5 lakh (4.75 million) cumulative biogas plants were completed in 2014, and increased to 49.8 lakh (4.98 million). During 2017–2018, the target was to establish 1.10 lakh biogas plants (1.10 million), but resulted in 0.15 lakh (0.015 million). In this way, the cost of refilling the gas cylinders with liquefied petroleum gas (LPG) was greatly reduced. Likewise, tons of wood/trees were protected from being axed, as wood is traditionally used as a fuel in rural and semi-urban households. Biogas is a viable alternative to traditional cooking fuels. The scheme generated employment for almost 300 skilled laborers for setting up the biogas plants. By 30th of May 2018, the Ministry had issued guidelines for the implementation of the NNBOMP during the period 2017–2018 to 2019–2020 [ 56 ].

The off-grid and decentralized solar photovoltaic application program—2018

The program deals with the energy demand through the deployment of solar lanterns, solar streetlights, solar home lights, and solar pumps. The plan intended to reach 118 MWp of off-grid PV capacity by 2020. The sanctioning target proposed outlay was 50 MWp by 2017–2018 and 68 MWp by 2019–2020. The total estimated cost amounted to INR 1895 crore (18950 Million INR, 265.547 million USD), and the ministry wanted to support 637 crores (6370 million INR, 89.263 million USD) by its central finance assistance. Solar power plants with a 25 KWp size were promoted in those areas where grid power does not reach households or is not reliable. Public service institutions, schools, panchayats, hostels, as well as police stations will benefit from this scheme. Solar study lamps were also included as a component in the program. Thirty percent of financial assistance was provided to solar power plants. Every student should bear 15% of the lamp cost, and the ministry wanted to support the remaining 85%. As of October 2018, lantern and lamps of more than 40 Lakhs (4 million), home lights of 16.72 lakhs (1.672 million) number, street lights of 6.40 lakhs (0.64 million), solar pumps of 1.96 lakhs (0.196 million), and 187.99 MWp stand-alone devices had been installed [ 57 , 58 ].

Major government initiatives for renewable energy

Technological initiatives.

The Technology Development and Innovation Policy (TDIP) released on the 6th of October 2017 was endeavored to promote research, development, and demonstration (RD&D) in the renewable energy sector [ 59 ]. RD&D intended to evaluate resources, progress in technology, commercialization, and the presentation of renewable energy technologies across the country. It aimed to produce renewable power devices and systems domestically. The evaluation of standards and resources, processes, materials, components, products, services, and sub-systems was carried out through RD&D. A development of the market, efficiency improvements, cost reductions, and a promotion of commercialization (scalability and bankability) were achieved through RD&D. Likewise, the percentage of renewable energy in the total electricity mix made it self-sustainable, industrially competitive, and profitable through RD&D. RD&D also supported technology development and demonstration in wind, solar, wind-solar hybrid, biofuel, biogas, hydrogen fuel cells, and geothermal energies. RD&D supported the R&D units of educational institutions, industries, and non-government organizations (NGOs). Sharing expertise, information, as well as institutional mechanisms for collaboration was realized by use of the technology development program (TDP). The various people involved in this program were policymakers, industrial innovators, associated stakeholders and departments, researchers, and scientists. Renowned R&D centers in India are the National Institute of Solar Energy (NISE), Gurgaon, the National Institute of Bio-Energy (NIBE), Kapurthala, and the National Institute of Wind Energy (NIWE), Chennai. The TDP strategy encouraged the exploration of innovative approaches and possibilities to obtain long-term targets. Likewise, it efficiently supported the transformation of knowledge into technology through a well-established monitoring system for the development of renewable technology that meets the electricity needs of India. The research center of excellence approved the TDI projects, which were funded to strengthen R&D. Funds were provided for conducting training and workshops. The MNRE is now preparing a database of R&D accomplishments in the renewable energy sector.

The Impacting Research Innovation and Technology (IMPRINT) program seeks to develop engineering and technology (prototype/process development) on a national scale. IMPRINT is steered by the Indian Institute of Technologies (IITs) and Indian Institute of science (IISCs). The expansion covers all areas of engineering and technology including renewable technology. The ministry of human resource development (MHRD) finances up to 50% of the total cost of the project. The remaining costs of the project are financed by the ministry (MNRE) via the RD&D program for renewable projects. Currently (2018–2019), five projects are under implementation in the area of solar thermal systems, storage for SPV, biofuel, and hydrogen and fuel cells which are funded by the MNRE (36.9 million INR, 0.518426 Million USD) and IMPRINT. Development of domestic technology and quality control are promoted through lab policies that were published on the 7th of December 2017. Lab policies were implemented to test, standardize, and certify renewable energy products and projects. They supported the improvement of the reliability and quality of the projects. Furthermore, Indian test labs are strengthened in line with international standards and practices through well-established lab policies. From 2015, the MNRE has provided “The New and Renewable Energy Young Scientist’s Award” to researchers/scientists who demonstrate exceptional accomplishments in renewable R&D.

Financial initiatives

One hundred percent financial assistance is granted by the MNRE to the government and NGOs and 50% financial support to the industry. The policy framework was developed to guide the identification of the project, the formulation, monitoring appraisal, approval, and financing. Between 2012 and 2017, a 4467.8 million INR, 62.52 Million USD) support was granted by the MNRE. The MNRE wanted to double the budget for technology development efforts in renewable energy for the current three-year plan period. Table 23 shows that the government is spending more and more for the development of the renewable energy sector. Financial support was provided to R&D projects. Exceptional consideration was given to projects that worked under extreme and hazardous conditions. Furthermore, financial support was applied to organizing awareness programs, demonstrations, training, workshops, surveys, assessment studies, etc. Innovative approaches will be rewarded with cash prizes. The winners will be presented with a support mechanism for transforming their ideas and prototypes into marketable commodities such as start-ups for entrepreneur development. Innovative projects will be financed via start-up support mechanisms, which will include an investment contract with investors. The MNRE provides funds to proposals for investigating policies and performance analyses related to renewable energy.

Technology validation and demonstration projects and other innovative projects with regard to renewables received a financial assistance of 50% of the project cost. The CFA applied to partnerships with industry and private institutions including engineering colleges. Private academic institutions, accredited by a government accreditation body, were also eligible to receive a 50% support. The concerned industries and institutions should meet the remaining 50% expenditure. The MNRE allocated an INR 3762.50 crore (INR 37625 million, 528.634 million USD) for the grid interactive renewable sources and an INR 1036.50 crore (INR 10365 million, 145.629 million USD) for off-grid/distributed and decentralized renewable power for the year 2018–2019 [ 60 ]. The MNRE asked the Reserve Bank of India (RBI), attempting to build renewable power projects under “priority sector lending” (priority lending should be done for renewable energy projects and without any limit) and to eliminate the obstacles in the financing of renewable energy projects. In July 2018, the Ministry of Finance announced that it would impose a 25% safeguard duty on solar panels and modules imported from China and Malaysia for 1 year. The quantum of tax might be reduced to 20% for the next 6 months, and 15% for the following 6 months.

Policy and regulatory framework initiatives

The regulatory interventions for the development of renewable energy sources are (a) tariff determination, (b) defining RPO, (c) promoting grid connectivity, and (d) promoting the expansion of the market.

Tariff policy amendments—2018

On the 30th of May 2018, the MoP released draft amendments to the tariff policy. The objective of these policies was to promote electricity generation from renewables. MoP in consultation with MNRE announced the long-term trajectory for RPO, which is represented in Table 24 . The State Electricity Regulatory Commission (SERC) achieved a favorable and neutral/off-putting effect in the growth of the renewable power sector through their RPO regulations in consultation with the MNRE. On the 25th of May 2018, the MNRE created an RPO compliance cell to reach India’s solar and wind power goals. Due to the absence of implementation of RPO regulations, several states in India did not meet their specified RPO objectives. The cell will operate along with the Central Electricity Regulatory Commission (CERC) and SERCs to obtain monthly statements on RPO compliance. It will also take up non-compliance associated concerns with the relevant officials.

Repowering policy—2016

On the 09th of August 2016, India announced a “repowering policy” for wind energy projects. An about 27 GW turnaround was possible according to the policy. This policy supports the replacing of aging wind turbines with more modern and powerful units (fewer, larger, taller) to raise the level of electricity generation. This policy seeks to create a simplified framework and to promote an optimized use of wind power resources. It is mandatory because the up to the year 2000 installed wind turbines were below 500 kW in sites where high wind potential might be achieved. It will be possible to obtain 3000 MW from the same location once replacements are in place. The policy was initially applied for the one MW installed capacity of wind turbines, and the MNRE will extend the repowering policy to other projects in the future based on experience. Repowering projects were implemented by the respective state nodal agencies/organizations that were involved in wind energy promotion in their states. The policy provided an exception from the Power Purchase Agreement (PPA) for wind farms/turbines undergoing repowering because they could not fulfill the requirements according to the PPA during repowering. The repowering projects may avail accelerated depreciation (AD) benefit or generation-based incentive (GBI) due to the conditions appropriate to new wind energy projects [ 61 ].

The wind-solar hybrid policy—2018

On the 14th of May 2018, the MNRE announced a national wind-solar hybrid policy. This policy supported new projects (large grid-connected wind-solar photovoltaic hybrid systems) and the hybridization of the already available projects. These projects tried to achieve an optimal and efficient use of transmission infrastructure and land. Better grid stability was achieved and the variability in renewable power generation was reduced. The best part of the policy intervention was that which supported the hybridization of existing plants. The tariff-based transparent bidding process was included in the policy. Regulatory authorities should formulate the necessary standards and regulations for hybrid systems. The policy also highlighted a battery storage in hybrid projects for output optimization and variability reduction [ 62 ].

The national offshore wind energy policy—2015

The National Offshore Wind Policy was released in October 2015. On the 19th of June 2018, the MNRE announced a medium-term target of 5 GW by 2022 and a long-term target of 30 GW by 2030. The MNRE called expressions of Interest (EoI) for the first 1 GW of offshore wind (the last date was 08.06.2018). The EoI site is located in Pipavav port at the Gulf of Khambhat at a distance of 23 km facilitating offshore wind (FOWIND) where the consortium deployed light detection and ranging (LiDAR) in November 2017). Pipavav port is situated off the coast of Gujarat. The MNRE had planned to install more such equipment in the states of Tamil Nadu and Gujarat. On the 14 th of December 2018, the MNRE, through the National Institute of Wind Energy (NIWE), called tender for offshore environmental impact assessment studies at intended LIDAR points at the Gulf of Mannar, off the coast of Tamil Nadu for offshore wind measurement. The timeline for initiatives was to firstly add 500 MW by 2022, 2 to 2.5 GW by 2027, and eventually reaching 5 GW between 2028 and 2032. Even though the installation of large wind power turbines in open seas is a challenging task, the government has endeavored to promote this offshore sector. Offshore wind energy would add its contribution to the already existing renewable energy mix for India [ 63 ] .

The feed-in tariff policy—2018

On the 28th of January 2016, the revised tariff policy was notified following the Electricity Act. On the 30th May 2018, the amendment in tariff policy was released. The intentions of this tariff policy are (a) an inexpensive and competitive electricity rate for the consumers; (b) to attract investment and financial viability; (c) to ensure that the perceptions of regulatory risks decrease through predictability, consistency, and transparency of policy measures; (d) development in quality of supply, increased operational efficiency, and improved competition; (e) increase the production of electricity from wind, solar, biomass, and small hydro; (f) peaking reserves that are acceptable in quantity or consistently good in quality or performance of grid operation where variable renewable energy source integration is provided through the promotion of hydroelectric power generation, including pumped storage projects (PSP); (g) to achieve better consumer services through efficient and reliable electricity infrastructure; (h) to supply sufficient and uninterrupted electricity to every level of consumers; and (i) to create adequate capacity, reserves in the production, transmission, and distribution that is sufficient for the reliability of supply of power to customers [ 64 ].

Training and educational initiatives

The MHRD has developed strong renewable energy education and training systems. The National Council for Vocational Training (NCVT) develops course modules, and a Modular Employable Skilling program (MES) in its regular 2-year syllabus to include SPV lighting systems, solar thermal systems, SHP, and provides the certificate for seven trades after the completion of a 2-year course. The seven trades are plumber, fitter, carpenter, welder, machinist, and electrician. The Ministry of Skill Development and Entrepreneurship (MSDE) worked out a national skill development policy in 2015. They provide regular training programs to create various job roles in renewable energy along with the MNRE support through a skill council for green jobs (SCGJ), the National Occupational Standards (NOS), and the Qualification Pack (QP). The SCGJ is promoted by the Confederation of Indian Industry (CII) and the MNRE. The industry partner for the SCGJ is ReNew Power [ 65 , 66 ].

The global status of India in renewable energy

Table 25 shows the RECAI (Renewable Energy Country Attractiveness Index) report of 40 countries. This report is based on the attractiveness of renewable energy investment and deployment opportunities. RECAI is based on macro vitals such as economic stability, investment climate, energy imperatives such as security and supply, clean energy gap, and affordability. It also includes policy enablement such as political stability and support for renewables. Its emphasis lies on project delivery parameters such as energy market access, infrastructure, and distributed generation, finance, cost and availability, and transaction liquidity. Technology potentials such as natural resources, power take-off attractiveness, potential support, technology maturity, and forecast growth are taken into consideration for ranking. India has moved to the fourth position of the RECAI-2018. Indian solar installations (new large-scale and rooftop solar capacities) in the calendar year 2017 increased exponentially with the addition of 9629 MW, whereas in 2016 it was 4313 MW. The warning of solar import tariffs and conflicts between developers and distribution firms are growing investor concerns [ 67 ]. Figure 6 shows the details of the installed capacity of global renewable energy in 2016 and 2017. Globally, 2017 GW renewable energy was installed in 2016, and in 2017, it increased to 2195 GW. Table 26 shows the total capacity addition of top countries until 2017. The country ranked fifth in renewable power capacity (including hydro energy), renewable power capacity (not including hydro energy) in fourth position, concentrating solar thermal power (CSP) and wind power were also in fourth position [ 68 ].

Globally installed capacity of renewable energy in 2017—Global 2018 status report with regard to renewables [ 68 ]

The investment opportunities in renewable energy in India

The investments into renewable energy in India increased by 22% in the first half of 2018 compared to 2017, while the investments in China dropped by 15% during the same period, according to a statement by the Bloomberg New Energy Finance (BNEF), which is shown in Table 27 [ 69 , 70 ]. At this rate, India is expected to overtake China and become the most significant growth market for renewable energy by the end of 2020. The country is eyeing pole position for transformation in renewable energy by reaching 175 GW by 2020. To achieve this target, it is quickly ramping up investments in this sector. The country added more renewable capacity than conventional capacity in 2018 when compared to 2017. India hosted the ISA first official summit on the 11.03.2018 for 121 countries. This will provide a standard platform to work toward the ambitious targets for renewable energy. The summit will emphasize India’s dedication to meet global engagements in a time-bound method. The country is also constructing many sizeable solar power parks comparable to, but larger than, those in China. Half of the earth’s ten biggest solar parks under development are in India.

In 2014, the world largest solar park was the Topaz solar farm in California with a 550 MW facility. In 2015, another operator in California, Solar Star, edged its capacity up to 579 MW. By 2016, India’s Kamuthi Solar Power Project in Tamil Nadu was on top with 648 MW of capacity (set up by the Adani Green Energy, part of the Adani Group, in Tamil Nadu). As of February 2017, the Longyangxia Dam Solar Park in China was the new leader, with 850 MW of capacity [ 71 ]. Currently, there are 600 MW operating units and 1400 MW units under construction. The Shakti Sthala solar park was inaugurated on 01.03.2018 in Pavagada (Karnataka, India) which is expected to become the globe’s most significant solar park when it accomplishes its full potential of 2 GW. Another large solar park with 1.5 GW is scheduled to be built in the Kadappa region [ 72 ]. The progress in solar power is remarkable and demonstrates real clean energy development on the ground.

The Kurnool ultra-mega solar park generated 800 million units (MU) of energy in October 2018 and saved over 700,000 tons of CO 2 . Rainwater was harvested using a reservoir that helps in cleaning solar panels and supplying water. The country is making remarkable progress in solar energy. The Kamuthi solar farm is cleaned each day by a robotic system. As the Indian economy expands, electricity consumption is forecasted to reach 15,280 TWh in 2040. With the government’s intent, green energy objectives, i.e., the renewable sector, grow considerably in an attractive manner with both foreign and domestic investors. It is anticipated to attract investments of up to USD 80 billion in the subsequent 4 years. The government of India has raised its 175 GW target to 225 GW of renewable energy capacity by 2022. The competitive benefit is that the country has sun exposure possible throughout the year and has an enormous hydropower potential. India was also listed fourth in the EY renewable energy country attractive index 2018. Sixty solar cities will be built in India as a section of MNRE’s “Solar cities” program.

In a regular auction, reduction in tariffs cost of the projects are the competitive benefits in the country. India accounts for about 4% of the total global electricity generation capacity and has the fourth highest installed capacity of wind energy and the third highest installed capacity of CSP. The solar installation in India erected during 2015–2016, 2016–2017, 2017–2018, and 2018–2019 was 3.01 GW, 5.52 GW, 9.36 GW, and 6.53 GW, respectively. The country aims to add 8.5 GW during 2019–2020. Due to its advantageous location in the solar belt (400 South to 400 North), the country is one of the largest beneficiaries of solar energy with relatively ample availability. An increase in the installed capacity of solar power is anticipated to exceed the installed capacity of wind energy, approaching 100 GW by 2022 from its current levels of 25.21226 GW as of December 2018. Fast falling prices have made Solar PV the biggest market for new investments. Under the Union Budget 2018–2019, a zero import tax on parts used in manufacturing solar panels was launched to provide an advantage to domestic solar panel companies [ 73 ].

Foreign direct investment (FDI) inflows in the renewable energy sector of India between April 2000 and June 2018 amounted to USD 6.84 billion according to the report of the department of industrial policy and promotion (DIPP). The DIPP was renamed (gazette notification 27.01.2019) the Department for the Promotion of Industry and Internal Trade (DPIIT). It is responsible for the development of domestic trade, retail trade, trader’s welfare including their employees as well as concerns associated with activities in facilitating and supporting business and startups. Since 2014, more than 42 billion USD have been invested in India’s renewable power sector. India reached US$ 7.4 billion in investments in the first half of 2018. Between April 2015 and June 2018, the country received USD 3.2 billion FDI in the renewable sector. The year-wise inflows expanded from USD 776 million in 2015–2016 to USD 783 million in 2016–2017 and USD 1204 million in 2017–2018. Between January to March of 2018, the INR 452 crore (4520 Million INR, 63.3389 million USD) of the FDI had already come in. The country is contributing with financial and promotional incentives that include a capital subsidy, accelerated depreciation (AD), waiver of inter-state transmission charges and losses, viability gap funding (VGF), and FDI up to 100% under the automated track.

The DIPP/DPIIT compiles and manages the data of the FDI equity inflow received in India [ 74 ]. The FDI equity inflow between April 2015 and June 2018 in the renewable sector is illustrated in Fig. 7 . It shows that the 2018–2019 3 months’ FDI equity inflow is half of that of the entire one of 2017–2018. It is evident from the figure that India has well-established FDI equity inflows. The significant FDI investments in the renewable energy sectors are shown in Table 28 . The collaboration between the Asian development bank and Renew Power Ventures private limited with 44.69 million USD ranked first followed by AIRRO Singapore with Diligent power with FDI equity inflow of 44.69 USD million.

The FDI equity inflow received between April 2015 and June 2018 in the renewable energy sector [ 73 ]

Strategies to promote investments

Strategies to promote investments (including FDI) by investors in the renewable sector:

Decrease constraints on FDI; provide open, transparent, and dependable conditions for foreign and domestic firms; and include ease of doing business, access to imports, comparatively flexible labor markets, and safeguard of intellectual property rights.

Establish an investment promotion agency (IPA) that targets suitable foreign investors and connects them as a catalyst with the domestic economy. Assist the IPA to present top-notch infrastructure and immediate access to skilled workers, technicians, engineers, and managers that might be needed to attract such investors. Furthermore, it should involve an after-investment care, recognizing the demonstration effects from satisfied investors, the potential for reinvestments, and the potential for cluster-development due to follow-up investments.

It is essential to consider the targeted sector (wind, solar, SPH or biomass, respectively) for which investments are required.

Establish the infrastructure needed for a quality investor, including adequate close-by transport facilities (airport, ports), a sufficient and steady supply of energy, a provision of a sufficiently skilled workforce, the facilities for the vocational training of specialized operators, ideally designed in collaboration with the investor.

Policy and other support mechanisms such as Power Purchase Agreements (PPA) play an influential role in underpinning returns and restricting uncertainties for project developers, indirectly supporting the availability of investment. Investors in renewable energy projects have historically relied on government policies to give them confidence about the costs necessary for electricity produced—and therefore for project revenues. Reassurance of future power costs for project developers is secured by signing a PPA with either a utility or an essential corporate buyer of electricity.

FiT have been the most conventional approach around the globe over the last decade to stimulate investments in renewable power projects. Set by the government concerned, they lay down an electricity tariff that developers of qualifying new projects might anticipate to receive for the resulting electricity over a long interval (15–20 years). These present investors in the tax equity of renewable power projects with a credit that they can manage to offset the tax burden outside in their businesses.

Table 29 presents the 2018 renewable energy investment report, source-wise, by the significant players in renewables according to the report of the Bloomberg New Energy Finance Report 2018. As per this report, global investment in renewable energy was USD of 279.8 billion in 2017. The top ten in the total global investments are China (126.1 $BN), the USA (40.5 $BN), Japan (13.4 $BN), India (10.9 $BN), Germany (10.4 $BN), Australia (8.5 $BN), UK (7.6 $BN), Brazil (6.0 $BN), Mexico (6.0 $BN), and Sweden (3.7 $BN) [ 75 ]. This achievement was possible since those countries have well-established strategies for promoting investments [ 76 , 77 ].

The appropriate objectives for renewable power expansion and investments are closely related to the Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs) objectives, the implementation of the NDC, on the road to achieving Paris promises, policy competence, policy reliability, market absorption capacity, and nationwide investment circumstances that are the real purposes for renewable power expansion, which is a significant factor for the investment strategies, as is shown in Table 30 .

The demand for investments for building a Paris-compatible and climate-resilient energy support remains high, particularly in emerging nations. Future investments in energy grids and energy flexibility are of particular significance. The strategies and the comparison chart between China, India, and the USA are presented in Table 31 .

Table 32 shows France in the first place due to overall favorable conditions for renewables, heading the G20 in investment attractiveness of renewables. Germany drops back one spot due to a decline in the quality of the global policy environment for renewables and some insufficiencies in the policy design, as does the UK. Overall, with four European countries on top of the list, Europe, however, directs the way in providing attractive conditions for investing in renewables. Despite high scores for various nations, no single government is yet close to growing a role model. All countries still have significant room for increasing investment demands to deploy renewables at the scale required to reach the Paris objectives. The table shown is based on the Paris compatible long-term vision, the policy environment for renewable energy, the conditions for system integration, the market absorption capacity, and general investment conditions. India moved from the 11th position to the 9th position in overall investments between 2017 and 2018.

A Paris compatible long-term vision includes a de-carbonization plan for the power system, the renewable power ambition, the coal and oil decrease, and the reliability of renewables policies. Direct support policies include medium-term certainty of policy signals, streamlined administrative procedures, ensuring project realization, facilitating the use of produced electricity. Conditions for system integration include system integration-grid codes, system integration-storage promotion, and demand-side management policies. A market absorption capacity includes a prior experience with renewable technologies, a current activity with renewable installations, and a presence of major renewable energy companies. General investment conditions include non-financial determinants, depth of the financial sector as well, as an inflation forecast.

Employment opportunities for citizens in renewable energy in India

Global employment scenario.

According to the 2018 Annual review of the IRENA [ 78 ], global renewable energy employment touched 10.3 million jobs in 2017, an improvement of 5.3% compared with the quantity published in 2016. Many socio-economic advantages derive from renewable power, but employment continues to be exceptionally centralized in a handful of countries, with China, Brazil, the USA, India, Germany, and Japan in the lead. In solar PV employment (3.4 million jobs), China is the leader (65% of PV Jobs) which is followed by Japan, USA, India, Bangladesh, Malaysia, Germany, Philippines, and Turkey. In biofuels employment (1.9 million jobs), Brazil is the leader (41% of PV Jobs) followed by the USA, Colombia, Indonesia, Thailand, Malaysia, China, and India. In wind employment (1.1 million jobs), China is the leader (44% of PV Jobs) followed by Germany, USA, India, UK, Brazil, Denmark, Netherlands, France, and Spain.

Table 33 shows global renewable energy employment in the corresponding technology branches. As in past years, China maintained the most notable number of people employed (3880 million jobs) estimating for 43% of the globe’s total which is shown in Fig. 8 . In India, new solar installations touched a record of 9.6 GW in 2017, efficiently increasing the total installed capacity. The employment in solar PV improved by 36% and reached 164,400 jobs, of which 92,400 represented on-grid use. IRENA determines that the building and installation covered 46% of these jobs, with operations and maintenance (O&M) representing 35% and 19%, individually. India does not produce solar PV because it could be imported from China, which is inexpensive. The market share of domestic companies (Indian supplier to renewable projects) declined from 13% in 2014–2015 to 7% in 2017–2018. If India starts the manufacturing base, more citizens will get jobs in the manufacturing field. India had the world’s fifth most significant additions of 4.1 GW to wind capacity in 2017 and the fourth largest cumulative capacity in 2018. IRENA predicts that jobs in the wind sector stood at 60,500.

Renewable energy employment in selected countries [ 79 ]

The jobs in renewables are categorized into technological development, installation/de-installation, operation, and maintenance. Tables 34 , 35 , 36 , and 37 show the wind industry, solar energy, biomass, and small hydro-related jobs in project development, component manufacturing, construction, operations, and education, training, and research. As technology quickly evolves, workers in all areas need to update their skills through continuing training/education or job training, and in several cases could benefit from professional certification. The advantages of moving to renewable energy are evident, and for this reason, the governments are responding positively toward the transformation to clean energy. Renewable energy can be described as the country’s next employment boom. Renewable energy job opportunities can transform rural economy [ 79 , 80 ]. The renewable energy sector might help to reduce poverty by creating better employment. For example, wind power is looking for specialists in manufacturing, project development, and construction and turbine installation as well as financial services, transportation and logistics, and maintenance and operations.

The government is building more renewable energy power plants that will require a workforce. The increasing investments in the renewable energy sector have the potential to provide more jobs than any other fossil fuel industry. Local businesses and renewable sectors will benefit from this change, as income will increase significantly. Many jobs in this sector will contribute to fixed salaries, healthcare benefits, and skill-building opportunities for unskilled and semi-skilled workers. A range of skilled and unskilled jobs are included in all renewable energy technologies, even though most of the positions in the renewable energy industry demand a skilled workforce. The renewable sector employs semi-skilled and unskilled labor in the construction, operations, and maintenance after proper training. Unskilled labor is employed as truck drivers, guards, cleaning, and maintenance. Semi-skilled labor is used to take regular readings from displays. A lack of consistent data on the potential employment impact of renewables expansion makes it particularly hard to assess the quantity of skilled, semi-skilled, and unskilled personnel that might be needed.

Key findings in renewable energy employment

The findings comprise (a) that the majority of employment in the renewable sector is contract based, and that employees do not benefit from permanent jobs or security. (b) Continuous work in the industry has the potential to decrease poverty. (c) Most poor citizens encounter obstacles to entry-level training and the employment market due to lack of awareness about the jobs and the requirements. (d) Few renewable programs incorporate developing ownership opportunities for the citizens and the incorporation of women in the sector. (e) The inadequacy of data makes it challenging to build relationships between employment in renewable energy and poverty mitigation.

Recommendations for renewable energy employment

When building the capacity, focus on poor people and individuals to empower them with training in operation and maintenance.

Develop and offer training programs for citizens with minimal education and training, who do not fit current programs, which restrict them from working in renewable areas.

Include women in the renewable workforce by providing localized training.

Establish connections between training institutes and renewable power companies to guarantee that (a) trained workers are placed in appropriate positions during and after the completion of the training program and (b) training programs match the requirements of the renewable sector.

Poverty impact assessments might be embedded in program design to know how programs motivate poverty reduction, whether and how they influence the community.

Allow people to have a sense of ownership in renewable projects because this could contribute to the growth of the sector.

The details of the job being offered (part time, full time, contract-based), the levels of required skills for the job (skilled, semi-skilled and unskilled), the socio-economic status of the employee data need to be collected for further analysis.

Conduct investigations, assisted by field surveys, to learn about the influence of renewable energy jobs on poverty mitigation and differences in the standard of living.

Challenges faced by renewable energy in India

The MNRE has been taking dedicated measures for improving the renewable sector, and its efforts have been satisfactory in recognizing various obstacles.

Policy and regulatory obstacles

A comprehensive policy statement (regulatory framework) is not available in the renewable sector. When there is a requirement to promote the growth of particular renewable energy technologies, policies might be declared that do not match with the plans for the development of renewable energy.

The regulatory framework and procedures are different for every state because they define the respective RPOs (Renewable Purchase Obligations) and this creates a higher risk of investments in this sector. Additionally, the policies are applicable for just 5 years, and the generated risk for investments in this sector is apparent. The biomass sector does not have an established framework.

Incentive accelerated depreciation (AD) is provided to wind developers and is evident in developing India’s wind-producing capacity. Wind projects installed more than 10 years ago show that they are not optimally maintained. Many owners of the asset have built with little motivation for tax benefits only. The policy framework does not require the maintenance of the wind projects after the tax advantages have been claimed. There is no control over the equipment suppliers because they undertake all wind power plant development activities such as commissioning, operation, and maintenance. Suppliers make the buyers pay a premium and increase the equipment cost, which brings burden to the buyer.

Furthermore, ready-made projects are sold to buyers. The buyers are susceptible to this trap to save income tax. Foreign investors hesitate to invest because they are exempted from the income tax.

Every state has different regulatory policy and framework definitions of an RPO. The RPO percentage specified in the regulatory framework for various renewable sources is not precise.

RPO allows the SERCs and certain private firms to procure only a part of their power demands from renewable sources.

RPO is not imposed on open access (OA) and captive consumers in all states except three.

RPO targets and obligations are not clear, and the RPO compliance cell has just started on 22.05.2018 to collect the monthly reports on compliance and deal with non-compliance issues with appropriate authorities.

Penalty mechanisms are not specified and only two states in India (Maharashtra and Rajasthan) have some form of penalty mechanisms.

The parameter to determine the tariff is not transparent in the regulatory framework and many SRECs have established a tariff for limited periods. The FiT is valid for only 5 years, and this affects the bankability of the project.

Many SERCs have not decided on adopting the CERC tariff that is mentioned in CERCs regulations that deal with terms and conditions for tariff determinations. The SERCs have considered the plant load factor (PLF) because it varies across regions and locations as well as particular technology. The current framework does not fit to these issues.

Third party sale (TPS) is not allowed because renewable generators are not allowed to sell power to commercial consumers. They have to sell only to industrial consumers. The industrial consumers have a low tariff and commercial consumers have a high tariff, and SRCS do not allow OA. This stops the profit for the developers and investors.

Institutional obstacles

Institutes, agencies stakeholders who work under the conditions of the MNRE show poor inter-institutional coordination. The progress in renewable energy development is limited by this lack of cooperation, coordination, and delays. The delay in implementing policies due to poor coordination, decrease the interest of investors to invest in this sector.

The single window project approval and clearance system is not very useful and not stable because it delays the receiving of clearances for the projects ends in the levy of a penalty on the project developer.

Pre-feasibility reports prepared by concerned states have some deficiency, and this may affect the small developers, i.e., the local developers, who are willing to execute renewable projects.

The workforce in institutes, agencies, and ministries is not sufficient in numbers.

Proper or well-established research centers are not available for the development of renewable infrastructure.

Customer care centers to guide developers regarding renewable projects are not available.

Standards and quality control orders have been issued recently in 2018 and 2019 only, and there are insufficient institutions and laboratories to give standards/certification and validate the quality and suitability of using renewable technology.

Financial and fiscal obstacles

There are a few budgetary constraints such as fund allocation, and budgets that are not released on time to fulfill the requirement of developing the renewable sector.

The initial unit capital costs of renewable projects are very high compared to fossil fuels, and this leads to financing challenges and initial burden.

There are uncertainties related to the assessment of resources, lack of technology awareness, and high-risk perceptions which lead to financial barriers for the developers.

The subsidies and incentives are not transparent, and the ministry might reconsider subsidies for renewable energy because there was a sharp fall in tariffs in 2018.

Power purchase agreements (PPA) signed between the power purchaser and power generators on pre-determined fixed tariffs are higher than the current bids (Economic survey 2017–2018 and union budget on the 01.02.2019). For example, solar power tariff dropped to 2.44 INR (0. 04 USD) per unit in May 2017, wind power INR 3.46 per unit in February 2017, and 2.64 INR per unit in October 2017.

Investors feel that there is a risk in the renewable sector as this sector has lower gross returns even though these returns are relatively high within the market standards.

There are not many developers who are interested in renewable projects. While newly established developers (small and local developers) do not have much of an institutional track record or financial input, which are needed to develop the project (high capital cost). Even moneylenders consider it risky and are not ready to provide funding. Moneylenders look exclusively for contractors who have much experience in construction, well-established suppliers with proven equipment and operators who have more experience.

If the performance of renewable projects, which show low-performance, faces financial obstacles, they risks the lack of funding of renewable projects.

Financial institutions such as government banks or private banks do not have much understanding or expertise in renewable energy projects, and this imposes financial barriers to the projects.

Delay in payment by the SERCs to the developers imposes debt burden on the small and local developers because moneylenders always work with credit enhancement mechanisms or guarantee bonds signed between moneylenders and the developers.

Market obstacles

Subsidies are adequately provided to conventional fossil fuels, sending the wrong impression that power from conventional fuels is of a higher priority than that from renewables (unfair structure of subsidies)

There are four renewable markets in India, the government market (providing budgetary support to projects and purchase the output of the project), the government-driven market (provide budgetary support or fiscal incentives to promote renewable energy), the loan market (taking loan to finance renewable based applications), and the cash market (buying renewable-based applications to meet personal energy needs by individuals). There is an inadequacy in promoting the loan market and cash market in India.

The biomass market is facing a demand-supply gap which results in a continuous and dramatic increase in biomass prices because the biomass supply is unreliable (and, as there is no organized market for fuel), and the price fluctuations are very high. The type of biomass is not the same in all the states of India, and therefore demand and price elasticity is high for biomass.

Renewable power was calculated based on cost-plus methods (adding direct material cost, direct labor cost, and product overhead cost). This does not include environmental cost and shields the ecological benefits of clean and green energy.

There is an inadequate evacuation infrastructure and insufficient integration of the grid, which affects the renewable projects. SERCs are not able to use all generated power to meet the needs because of the non-availability of a proper evacuation infrastructure. This has an impact on the project, and the SERCs are forced to buy expensive power from neighbor states to fulfill needs.

Extending transmission lines is not possible/not economical for small size projects, and the seasonality of generation from such projects affect the market.

There are few limitations in overall transmission plans, distribution CapEx plans, and distribution licenses for renewable power. Power evacuation infrastructure for renewable energy is not included in the plans.

Even though there is an increase in capacity for the commercially deployed renewable energy technology, there is no decline in capital cost. This cost of power also remains high. The capital cost quoted by the developers and providers of equipment is too high due to exports of machinery, inadequate built up capacity, and cartelization of equipment suppliers (suppliers join together to control prices and limit competition).

There is no adequate supply of land, for wind, solar, and solar thermal power plants, which lead to poor capacity addition in many states.

Technological obstacles

Every installation of a renewable project contributes to complex risk challenges from environmental uncertainties, natural disasters, planning, equipment failure, and profit loss.

MNRE issued the standardization of renewable energy projects policy on the 11th of December 2017 (testing, standardization, and certification). They are still at an elementary level as compared to international practices. Quality assurance processes are still under starting conditions. Each success in renewable energy is based on concrete action plans for standards, testing and certification of performance.

The quality and reliability of manufactured components, imported equipment, and subsystems is essential, and hence quality infrastructure should be established. There is no clear document related to testing laboratories, referral institutes, review mechanism, inspection, and monitoring.

There are not many R&D centers for renewables. Methods to reduce the subsidies and invest in R&D lagging; manufacturing facilities are just replicating the already available technologies. The country is dependent on international suppliers for equipment and technology. Spare parts are not manufactured locally and hence they are scarce.

Awareness, education, and training obstacles

There is an unavailability of appropriately skilled human resources in the renewable energy sector. Furthermore, it faces an acute workforce shortage.

After installation of renewable project/applications by the suppliers, there is no proper follow-up or assistance for the workers in the project to perform maintenance. Likewise, there are not enough trained and skilled persons for demonstrating, training, operation, and maintenance of the plant.

There is inadequate knowledge in renewables, and no awareness programs are available to the general public. The lack of awareness about the technologies is a significant obstacle in acquiring vast land for constructing the renewable plant. Moreover, people using agriculture lands are not prepared to give their land to construct power plants because most Indians cultivate plants.

The renewable sector depends on the climate, and this varying climate also imposes less popularity of renewables among the people.

The per capita income is low, and the people consider that the cost of renewables might be high and they might not be able to use renewables.

The storage system increases the cost of renewables, and people believe it too costly and are not ready to use them.

The environmental benefits of renewable technologies are not clearly understood by the people and negative perceptions are making renewable technologies less prevalent among them.

Environmental obstacles

A single wind turbine does not occupy much space, but many turbines are placed five to ten rotor diameters from each other, and this occupies more area, which include roads and transmission lines.

In the field of offshore wind, the turbines and blades are bigger than onshore wind turbines, and they require a substantial amount of space. Offshore installations affect ocean activities (fishing, sand extraction, gravel extraction, oil extraction, gas extraction, aquaculture, and navigation). Furthermore, they affect fish and other marine wildlife.

Wind turbines influence wildlife (birds and bats) because of the collisions with them and due to air pressure changes caused by wind turbines and habitat disruption. Making wind turbines motionless during times of low wind can protect birds and bats but is not practiced.

Sound (aerodynamic, mechanical) and visual impacts are associated with wind turbines. There is poor practice by the wind turbine developers regarding public concerns. Furthermore, there are imperfections in surfaces and sound—absorbent material which decrease the noise from turbines. The shadow flicker effect is not taken as severe environmental impact by the developers.

Sometimes wind turbine material production, transportation of materials, on-site construction, assembling, operation, maintenance, dismantlement, and decommissioning may be associated with global warming, and there is a lag in this consideration.

Large utility-scale solar plants require vast lands that increase the risk of land degradation and loss of habitat.

The PV cell manufacturing process includes hazardous chemicals such as 1-1-1 Trichloroethene, HCL, H 2 SO 4 , N 2 , NF, and acetone. Workers face risks resulting from inhaling silicon dust. The manufacturing wastes are not disposed of properly. Proper precautions during usage of thin-film PV cells, which contain cadmium—telluride, gallium arsenide, and copper-indium-gallium-diselenide are missing. These materials create severe public health threats and environmental threats.

Hydroelectric power turbine blades kill aquatic ecosystems (fish and other organisms). Moreover, algae and other aquatic weeds are not controlled through manual harvesting or by introducing fish that can eat these plants.

Discussion and recommendations based on the research

Policy and regulation advancements.

The MNRE should provide a comprehensive action plan or policy for the promotion of the renewable sector in its regulatory framework for renewables energy. The action plan can be prepared in consultation with SERCs of the country within a fixed timeframe and execution of the policy/action plan.

The central and state government should include a “Must run status” in their policy and follow it strictly to make use of renewable power.

A national merit order list for renewable electricity generation will reduce power cost for the consumers. Such a merit order list will help in ranking sources of renewable energy in an ascending order of price and will provide power at a lower cost to each distribution company (DISCOM). The MNRE should include that principle in its framework and ensure that SERCs includes it in their regulatory framework as well.

SERCs might be allowed to remove policies and regulatory uncertainty surrounding renewable energy. SERCs might be allowed to identify the thrust areas of their renewable energy development.

There should be strong initiatives from municipality (local level) approvals for renewable energy-based projects.

Higher market penetration is conceivable only if their suitable codes and standards are adopted and implemented. MNRE should guide minimum performance standards, which incorporate reliability, durability, and performance.

A well-established renewable energy certificates (REC) policy might contribute to an efficient funding mechanism for renewable energy projects. It is necessary for the government to look at developing the REC ecosystem.

The regulatory administration around the RPO needs to be upgraded with a more efficient “carrot and stick” mechanism for obligated entities. A regulatory mechanism that both remunerations compliance and penalizes for non-compliance may likely produce better results.

RECs in India should only be traded on exchange. Over-the-counter (OTC) or off-exchange trading will potentially allow greater participation in the market. A REC forward curve will provide further price determination to the market participants.

The policymakers should look at developing and building the REC market.

Most states have defined RPO targets. Still, due to the absence of implemented RPO regulations and the inadequacy of penalties when obligations are not satisfied, several of the state DISCOMs are not complying completely with their RPO targets. It is necessary that all states adhere to the RPO targets set by respective SERCs.

The government should address the issues such as DISCOM financials, must-run status, problems of transmission and evacuation, on-time payments and payment guarantees, and deemed generation benefits.

Proper incentives should be devised to support utilities to obtain power over and above the RPO mandated by the SERC.

The tariff orders/FiTs must be consistent and not restricted for a few years.

Transmission requirements

The developers are worried that transmission facilities are not keeping pace with the power generation. Bays at the nearest substations are occupied, and transmission lines are already carrying their full capacity. This is due to the lack of coordination between MNRE and the Power Grid Corporation of India (PGCIL) and CEA. Solar Corporation of India (SECI) is holding auctions for both wind and solar projects without making sure that enough evacuation facilities are available. There is an urgent need to make evacuation plans.

The solution is to develop numerous substations and transmission lines, but the process will take considerably longer time than the currently under-construction projects take to get finished.

In 2017–2018, transmission lines were installed under the green energy corridor project by the PGCIL, with 1900 circuit km targeted in 2018–2019. The implementation of the green energy corridor project explicitly meant to connect renewable energy plants to the national grid. The budget allocation of INR 6 billion for 2018–2019 should be increased to higher values.

The mismatch between MNRE and PGCIL, which are responsible for inter-state transmission, should be rectified.

State transmission units (STUs) are responsible for the transmission inside the states, and their fund requirements to cover the evacuation and transmission infrastructure for renewable energy should be fulfilled. Moreover, STUs should be penalized if they fail to fulfill their responsibilities.

The coordination and consultation between the developers (the nodal agency responsible for the development of renewable energy) and STUs should be healthy.

Financing the renewable sector

The government should provide enough budget for the clean energy sector. China’s annual budget for renewables is 128 times higher than India’s. In 2017, China spent USD 126.6 billion (INR 9 lakh crore) compared to India’s USD 10.9 billion (INR 75500 crore). In 2018, budget allocations for grid interactive wind and solar have increased but it is not sufficient to meet the renewable target.

The government should concentrate on R&D and provide a surplus fund for R&D. In 2017, the budget allotted was an INR 445 crore, which was reduced to an INR 272.85 crore in 2016. In 2017–2018, the initial allocation was an INR 144 crore that was reduced to an INR 81 crore during the revised estimates. Even the reduced amounts could not be fully used, there is an urgent demand for regular monitoring of R&D and the budget allocation.

The Goods and Service Tax (GST) that was introduced in 2017 worsened the industry performance and has led to an increase in costs and poses a threat to the viability of the ongoing projects, ultimately hampering the target achievement. These GST issues need to be addressed.

Including the renewable sector as a priority sector would increase the availability of credit and lead to a more substantial participation by commercial banks.

Mandating the provident funds and insurance companies to invest the fixed percentage of their portfolio into the renewable energy sector.

Banks should allow an interest rebate on housing loans if the owner is installing renewable applications such as solar lights, solar water heaters, and PV panels in his house. This will encourage people to use renewable energy. Furthermore, income tax rebates also can be given to individuals if they are implementing renewable energy applications.

Improvement in manufacturing/technology

The country should move to domestic manufacturing. It imports 90% of its solar cell and module requirements from Malaysia, China, and Taiwan, so it is essential to build a robust domestic manufacturing basis.

India will provide “safeguard duty” for merely 2 years, and this is not adequate to build a strong manufacturing basis that can compete with the global market. Moreover, safeguard duty would work only if India had a larger existing domestic manufacturing base.

The government should reconsider the safeguard duty. Many foreign companies desiring to set up joint ventures in India provide only a lukewarm response because the given order in its current form presents inadequate safeguards.

There are incremental developments in technology at regular periods, which need capital, and the country should discover a way to handle these factors.

To make use of the vast estimated renewable potential in India, the R&D capability should be upgraded to solve critical problems in the clean energy sector.

A comprehensive policy for manufacturing should be established. This would support capital cost reduction and be marketed on a global scale.

The country should initiate an industry-academia partnership, which might promote innovative R&D and support leading-edge clean power solutions to protect the globe for future generations.

Encourage the transfer of ideas between industry, academia, and policymakers from around the world to develop accelerated adoption of renewable power.

Awareness about renewables

Social recognition of renewable energy is still not very promising in urban India. Awareness is the crucial factor for the uniform and broad use of renewable energy. Information about renewable technology and their environmental benefits should reach society.

The government should regularly organize awareness programs throughout the country, especially in villages and remote locations such as the islands.

The government should open more educational/research organizations, which will help in spreading knowledge of renewable technology in society.

People should regularly be trained with regard to new techniques that would be beneficial for the community.

Sufficient agencies should be available to sell renewable products and serve for technical support during installation and maintenance.

Development of the capabilities of unskilled and semiskilled workers and policy interventions are required related to employment opportunities.

An increase in the number of qualified/trained personnel might immediately support the process of installations of renewables.

Renewable energy employers prefer to train employees they recruit because they understand that education institutes fail to give the needed and appropriate skills. The training institutes should rectify this issue. Severe trained human resources shortages should be eliminated.

Upgrading the ability of the existing workforce and training of new professionals is essential to achieve the renewable goal.

Hybrid utilization of renewables

The country should focus on hybrid power projects for an effective use of transmission infrastructure and land.

India should consider battery storage in hybrid projects, which support optimizing the production and the power at competitive prices as well as a decrease of variability.

Formulate mandatory standards and regulations for hybrid systems, which are lagging in the newly announced policies (wind-solar hybrid policy on 14.05.2018).

The hybridization of two or more renewable systems along with the conventional power source battery storage can increase the performance of renewable technologies.

Issues related to sizing and storage capacity should be considered because they are key to the economic viability of the system.

Fiscal and financial incentives available for hybrid projects should be increased.

The renewable sector suffers notable obstacles. Some of them are inherent in every renewable technology; others are the outcome of a skewed regulative structure and marketplace. The absence of comprehensive policies and regulation frameworks prevent the adoption of renewable technologies. The renewable energy market requires explicit policies and legal procedures to enhance the attention of investors. There is a delay in the authorization of private sector projects because of a lack of clear policies. The country should take measures to attract private investors. Inadequate technology and the absence of infrastructure required to establish renewable technologies should be overcome by R&D. The government should allow more funds to support research and innovation activities in this sector. There are insufficiently competent personnel to train, demonstrate, maintain, and operate renewable energy structures and therefore, the institutions should be proactive in preparing the workforce. Imported equipment is costly compared to that of locally manufactured; therefore, generation of renewable energy becomes expensive and even unaffordable. Hence, to decrease the cost of renewable products, the country should become involve in the manufacturing of renewable products. Another significant infrastructural obstacle to the development of renewable energy technologies is unreliable connectivity to the grid. As a consequence, many investors lose their faith in renewable energy technologies and are not ready to invest in them for fear of failing. India should work on transmission and evacuation plans.

Inadequate servicing and maintenance of facilities and low reliability in technology decreases customer trust in some renewable energy technologies and hence prevent their selection. Adequate skills to repair/service the spare parts/equipment are required to avoid equipment failures that halt the supply of energy. Awareness of renewable energy among communities should be fostered, and a significant focus on their socio-cultural practices should be considered. Governments should support investments in the expansion of renewable energy to speed up the commercialization of such technologies. The Indian government should declare a well-established fiscal assistance plan, such as the provision of credit, deduction on loans, and tariffs. The government should improve regulations making obligations under power purchase agreements (PPAs) statutorily binding to guarantee that all power DISCOMs have PPAs to cover a hundred percent of their RPO obligation. To accomplish a reliable system, it is strongly suggested that renewables must be used in a hybrid configuration of two or more resources along with conventional source and storage devices. Regulatory authorities should formulate the necessary standards and regulations for hybrid systems. Making investments economically possible with effective policies and tax incentives will result in social benefits above and beyond the economic advantages.

Availability of data and materials

Not applicable.

Abbreviations

Accelerated depreciation

Billion units

Central Electricity Authority of India

Central electricity regulatory commission

Central financial assistance

Expression of interest

Foreign direct investment

Feed-in-tariff

Ministry of new and renewable energy

Research and development

Renewable purchase obligations

State electricity regulatory

Small hydropower

Terawatt hours

Waste to energy

Chr.Von Zabeltitz (1994) Effective use of renewable energies for greenhouse heating. Renewable Energy 5:479-485.

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The authors gratefully acknowledge the support provided by the Research Consultancy Institute (RCI) and the department of Electrical and Computer Engineering of Effat University, Saudi Arabia.

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Kumar. J, C.R., Majid, M.A. Renewable energy for sustainable development in India: current status, future prospects, challenges, employment, and investment opportunities. Energ Sustain Soc 10 , 2 (2020). https://doi.org/10.1186/s13705-019-0232-1

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Benefits of Renewable Energy Use

Published Jul 14, 2008 Updated Dec 20, 2017

Wind turbines and solar panels are an increasingly common sight. But why? What are the benefits of renewable energies—and how do they improve our health, environment, and economy?

This page explores the many positive impacts of clean energy, including the benefits of wind , solar , geothermal , hydroelectric , and biomass . For more information on their negative impacts—including effective solutions to avoid, minimize, or mitigate—see our page on  The Environmental Impacts of Renewable Energy Technologies .

Less global warming

Human activity is overloading our atmosphere with carbon dioxide and other  global warming emissions . These gases act like a blanket, trapping heat. The result is a web of  significant and harmful impacts , from stronger, more frequent storms, to drought, sea level rise, and extinction.

In the United States, about 29 percent of global warming emissions come from our electricity sector. Most of those emissions come from fossil fuels like coal and natural gas [ 1 ,  2 ].

What is CO 2 e?

Carbon dioxide (CO 2 ) is the most prevalent greenhouse gas, but other air pollutants—such as methane—also cause global warming. Different energy sources produce different amounts of these pollutants. To make comparisons easier, we use a carbon dioxide equivalent , or CO2e—the amount of carbon dioxide required to produce an equivalent amount of warming.

In contrast, most renewable energy sources produce little to no global warming emissions. Even when including “life cycle” emissions of clean energy (ie, the emissions from each stage of a technology’s life—manufacturing, installation, operation, decommissioning), the global warming emissions associated with renewable energy are minimal [ 3 ].

The comparison becomes clear when you look at the numbers. Burning natural gas for electricity releases between 0.6 and 2 pounds of carbon dioxide equivalent per kilowatt-hour (CO2E/kWh); coal emits between 1.4 and 3.6 pounds of CO2E/kWh.  Wind , on the other hand, is responsible for only 0.02 to 0.04 pounds of CO2E/kWh on a life-cycle basis;  solar  0.07 to 0.2;  geothermal  0.1 to 0.2; and  hydroelectric  between 0.1 and 0.5.

Renewable electricity generation from  biomass  can have a wide range of global warming emissions depending on the resource and whether or not it is sustainably sourced and harvested.

Increasing the supply of renewable energy would allow us to replace carbon-intensive energy sources and significantly reduce US global warming emissions.

For example, a 2009 UCS analysis found that a 25 percent by 2025 national renewable electricity standard would lower power plant CO2 emissions 277 million metric tons annually by 2025—the equivalent of the annual output from 70 typical (600 MW) new coal plants [ 4 ].

In addition, a ground-breaking study by the US Department of Energy's National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL) explored the feasibility of generating 80 percent of the country’s electricity from renewable sources by 2050. They found that renewable energy could help reduce the electricity sector’s emissions by approximately 81 percent [ 5 ].

Improved public health

The air and water pollution emitted by coal and natural gas plants is linked with breathing problems, neurological damage, heart attacks, cancer, premature death, and a host of other serious problems. The pollution affects everyone: one Harvard University study estimated the life cycle costs and public health effects of coal to be an estimated $74.6 billion every year . That’s equivalent to 4.36 cents per kilowatt-hour of electricity produced—about one-third of the average electricity rate for a typical US home [ 6 ].

Most of these negative health impacts come from air and water pollution that clean energy technologies simply don’t produce. Wind, solar, and hydroelectric systems generate electricity with no associated air pollution emissions. Geothermal and biomass systems emit some air pollutants, though total air emissions are generally much lower than those of coal- and natural gas-fired power plants.

In addition, wind and solar energy require essentially no water to operate and thus do not pollute water resources or strain supplies by competing with agriculture, drinking water, or other important water needs. In contrast, fossil fuels can have a  significant impact on water resources : both coal mining and natural gas drilling can pollute sources of drinking water, and all thermal power plants, including those powered by coal, gas, and oil, withdraw and consume water for cooling. 

Biomass and geothermal power plants, like coal- and natural gas-fired power plants, may require water for cooling. Hydroelectric power plants can disrupt river ecosystems both upstream and downstream from the dam. However, NREL's 80-percent-by-2050 renewable energy study, which included biomass and geothermal, found that total water consumption and withdrawal would decrease significantly in a future with high renewables [ 7 ].

Inexhaustible energy

Strong winds, sunny skies, abundant plant matter, heat from the earth, and fast-moving water can each provide a vast and constantly replenished supply of energy. A relatively small fraction of US electricity currently comes from these sources, but that could change: studies have repeatedly shown that renewable energy can provide a significant share of future electricity needs, even after accounting for potential constraints [ 9 ].

In fact, a major government-sponsored study found that clean energy could contribute somewhere between three and 80 times its 2013 levels, depending on assumptions [8]. And the previously mentioned NREL study found that renewable energy could comfortably provide up to 80 percent of US electricity by 2050.

Getting Excited About Energy: Expanding Renewables in the US

Jobs and other economic benefits.

Compared with fossil fuel technologies, which are typically mechanized and capital intensive, the renewable energy industry is more labor intensive. Solar panels need humans to install them; wind farms need technicians for maintenance.

This means that, on average, more jobs are created for each unit of electricity generated from renewable sources than from fossil fuels.

Renewable energy already supports thousands of jobs in the United States. In 2016, the wind energy industry directly employed over 100,000 full-time-equivalent employees in a variety of capacities, including manufacturing, project development, construction and turbine installation, operations and maintenance, transportation and logistics, and financial, legal, and consulting services [ 10 ]. More than 500 factories in the United States manufacture parts for wind turbines, and wind power project installations in 2016 alone represented $13.0 billion in investments [ 11 ].

Other renewable energy technologies employ even more workers. In 2016, the solar industry employed more than 260,000 people, including jobs in solar installation, manufacturing, and sales, a 25% increase over 2015 [ 12 ]. The hydroelectric power industry employed approximately 66,000 people in 2017 [ 13 ]; the geothermal industry employed 5,800 people [ 14] .

Increased support for renewable energy could create even more jobs. The 2009 Union of Concerned Scientists study of a 25-percent-by-2025 renewable energy standard found that such a policy would create more than three times as many jobs (more than 200,000) as producing an equivalent amount of electricity from fossil fuels [ 15 ]. 

In contrast, the entire coal industry employed 160,000 people in 2016 [ 26 ].

In addition to the jobs directly created in the renewable energy industry, growth in clean energy can create positive economic “ripple” effects. For example, industries in the renewable energy supply chain will benefit, and unrelated local businesses will benefit from increased household and business incomes [ 16 ].

Local governments also benefit from clean energy, most often in the form of property and income taxes and other payments from renewable energy project owners. Owners of the land on which wind projects are built often receive lease payments ranging from $3,000 to $6,000 per megawatt of installed capacity, as well as payments for power line easements and road rights-of-way. They may also earn royalties based on the project’s annual revenues. Farmers and rural landowners can generate new sources of supplemental income by producing feedstocks for biomass power facilities.

UCS analysis found that a 25-by-2025 national renewable electricity standard would stimulate $263.4 billion in new capital investment for renewable energy technologies, $13.5 billion in new landowner income from? biomass production and/or wind land lease payments, and $11.5 billion in new property tax revenue for local communities [ 17 ].

Stable energy prices

Renewable energy is providing affordable electricity across the country right now, and can help stabilize energy prices in the future.

Although renewable facilities require upfront investments to build, they can then operate at very low cost (for most clean energy technologies, the “fuel” is free). As a result, renewable energy prices can be very stable over time.

Moreover, the costs of renewable energy technologies have declined steadily, and are projected to drop even more. For example, the average price to install solar dropped more than 70 percent between 2010 and 2017 [ 20 ]. The cost of generating electricity from wind dropped 66 percent between 2009 and 2016 [ 21 ]. Costs will likely decline even further as markets mature and companies increasingly take advantage of economies of scale.

In contrast, fossil fuel prices can vary dramatically and are prone to substantial price swings. For example, there was a rapid increase in US coal prices due to rising global demand before 2008, then a rapid fall after 2008 when global demands declined [ 23 ]. Likewise, natural gas prices have fluctuated greatly since 2000 [ 25 ].

Using more renewable energy can lower the prices of and demand for natural gas and coal by increasing competition and diversifying our energy supplies. And an increased reliance on renewable energy can help protect consumers when fossil fuel prices spike. 

Barriers to Renewable Energy Technologies

Reliability and resilience.

 Wind and solar are less prone to large-scale failure because they are distributed and modular. Distributed systems are spread out over a large geographical area, so a severe weather event in one location will not cut off power to an entire region. Modular systems are composed of numerous individual wind turbines or solar arrays. Even if some of the equipment in the system is damaged, the rest can typically continue to operate.

For example, Hurricane Sandy damaged fossil fuel-dominated electric generation and distribution systems in New York and New Jersey and left millions of people without power. In contrast, renewable energy projects in the Northeast weathered Hurricane Sandy with minimal damage or disruption [ 25 ]. 

Water scarcity is another risk for non-renewable power plants. Coal, nuclear, and many natural gas plants depend on having sufficient water for cooling, which means that severe droughts and heat waves can put electricity generation at risk. Wind and solar photovoltaic systems do not require water to generate electricity and can operate reliably in conditions that may otherwise require closing a fossil fuel-powered plant. (For more information, see  How it Works: Water for Electricity .)  

The risk of disruptive events will also increase in the future as droughts, heat waves, more intense storms, and increasingly severe wildfires become more frequent due to global warming—increasing the need for resilient, clean technologies.

References:

[1] Environmental Protection Agency. 2017. Inventory of U.S. Greenhouse Gas Emissions and Sinks: 1990-2015.

[2] Energy Information Agency (EIA). 2017.  How much of the U.S. carbon dioxide emissions are associated with electricity generation?

[3] Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC). 2011.  IPCC Special Report on Renewable Energy Sources and Climate Change Mitigation . Prepared by Working Group III of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change [O. Edenhofer, R. Pichs-Madruga, Y. Sokona, K. Seyboth, P. Matschoss, S. Kadner, T. Zwickel, P. Eickemeier, G. Hansen, S. Schlömer, C. von Stechow (eds)]. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, United Kingdom and New York, NY, USA, 1075 pp. (Chapter 9).

[4] Union of Concerned Scientists (UCS). 2009.  Clean Power Green Jobs .

[5] National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL). 2012.  Renewable Electricity Futures Study . Volume 1, pg. 210.

[6] Epstein, P.R.,J. J. Buonocore, K. Eckerle, M. Hendryx, B. M. Stout III, R. Heinberg, R. W. Clapp, B. May, N. L. Reinhart, M. M. Ahern, S. K. Doshi, and L. Glustrom. 2011. Full cost accounting for the life cycle of coal in “Ecological Economics Reviews.” Ann. N.Y. Acad. Sci. 1219: 73–98.

[7]  Renewable Electricity Futures Study . 2012.

[8] NREL. 2016.  Estimating Renewable Energy Economic Potential in the United States: Methodology and Initial Results .

[9]  Renewable Electricity Futures Study . 2012.

IPCC Special Report on Renewable Energy Sources and Climate Change Mitigation . Prepared by Working Group III of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. 2011.

UCS. 2009.  Climate 2030: A national blueprint for a clean energy economy .

[10] American Wind Energy Association (AWEA). 2017. AWEA U.S. Wind Industry Annual Market Report: Year Ending 2016. Washington, D.C.: American Wind Energy Association.

 [11] Wiser, Ryan, and Mark Bolinger. 2017. 2016 Wind Technologies Market Report. U.S. Department of Energy.

[12] The Solar Foundation. 2017. National Solar Jobs Census 2016.

[13] Navigant Consulting. 2009.  Job Creation Opportunities in Hydropower .

[14] Geothermal Energy Association. 2010.  Green Jobs through Geothermal Energy .

[15] UCS. 2009.  Clean Power Green Jobs .

[16] Environmental Protection Agency. 2010.  Assessing the Multiple Benefits of Clean Energy: A Resource for States . Chapter 5.

[17] UCS. 2009.  Clean Power Green Jobs .

[18] Deyette, J., and B. Freese. 2010.  Burning coal, burning cash: Ranking the states that import the most coal . Cambridge, MA: Union of Concerned Scientists.

[20] SEIA. 2017. Solar Market Insight Report 2017 Q2.

[21] AWEA. 2017. AWEA U.S. Wind Industry Annual Market Report: Year Ending 2016. Washington, D.C.: American Wind Energy Association.

[22] UCS. 2009.  Clean Power Green Jobs .

[23] UCS. 2011.  A Risky Proposition: The financial hazards of new investments in coal plants .

[24] EIA. 2013.  U.S. Natural Gas Wellhead Price .

[25] Unger, David J. 2012.  Are renewables stormproof? Hurricane Sandy tests solar, wind . The Christian Science Monitor. November 19.

[26] Department of Energy. 2017 U.S. Energy and Employment Report

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What is renewable energy?

Renewable energy is energy derived from natural sources that are replenished at a higher rate than they are consumed. Sunlight and wind, for example, are such sources that are constantly being replenished. Renewable energy sources are plentiful and all around us.

Fossil fuels - coal, oil and gas - on the other hand, are non-renewable resources that take hundreds of millions of years to form. Fossil fuels, when burned to produce energy, cause harmful greenhouse gas emissions, such as carbon dioxide.

Generating renewable energy creates far lower emissions than burning fossil fuels. Transitioning from fossil fuels, which currently account for the lion’s share of emissions, to renewable energy is key to addressing the climate crisis.

Renewables are now cheaper in most countries, and generate three times more jobs than fossil fuels.

Here are a few common sources of renewable energy:

SOLAR ENERGY

Solar energy is the most abundant of all energy resources and can even be harnessed in cloudy weather. The rate at which solar energy is intercepted by the Earth is about 10,000 times greater than the rate at which humankind consumes energy.

Solar technologies can deliver heat, cooling, natural lighting, electricity, and fuels for a host of applications. Solar technologies convert sunlight into electrical energy either through photovoltaic panels or through mirrors that concentrate solar radiation.

Although not all countries are equally endowed with solar energy, a significant contribution to the energy mix from direct solar energy is possible for every country.

The cost of manufacturing solar panels has plummeted dramatically in the last decade, making them not only affordable but often the cheapest form of electricity. Solar panels have a lifespan of roughly 30 years , and come in variety of shades depending on the type of material used in manufacturing.

WIND ENERGY

Wind energy harnesses the kinetic energy of moving air by using large wind turbines located on land (onshore) or in sea- or freshwater (offshore). Wind energy has been used for millennia, but onshore and offshore wind energy technologies have evolved over the last few years to maximize the electricity produced - with taller turbines and larger rotor diameters.

Though average wind speeds vary considerably by location, the world’s technical potential for wind energy exceeds global electricity production, and ample potential exists in most regions of the world to enable significant wind energy deployment.

Many parts of the world have strong wind speeds, but the best locations for generating wind power are sometimes remote ones. Offshore wind power offers t remendous potential .

GEOTHERMAL ENERGY

Geothermal energy utilizes the accessible thermal energy from the Earth’s interior. Heat is extracted from geothermal reservoirs using wells or other means.

Reservoirs that are naturally sufficiently hot and permeable are called hydrothermal reservoirs, whereas reservoirs that are sufficiently hot but that are improved with hydraulic stimulation are called enhanced geothermal systems.

Once at the surface, fluids of various temperatures can be used to generate electricity. The technology for electricity generation from hydrothermal reservoirs is mature and reliable, and has been operating for more than 100 years .

Hydropower harnesses the energy of water moving from higher to lower elevations. It can be generated from reservoirs and rivers. Reservoir hydropower plants rely on stored water in a reservoir, while run-of-river hydropower plants harness energy from the available flow of the river.

Hydropower reservoirs often have multiple uses - providing drinking water, water for irrigation, flood and drought control, navigation services, as well as energy supply.

Hydropower currently is the largest source of renewable energy in the electricity sector. It relies on generally stable rainfall patterns, and can be negatively impacted by climate-induced droughts or changes to ecosystems which impact rainfall patterns.

The infrastructure needed to create hydropower can also impact on ecosystems in adverse ways. For this reason, many consider small-scale hydro a more environmentally-friendly option , and especially suitable for communities in remote locations.

OCEAN ENERGY

Ocean energy derives from technologies that use the kinetic and thermal energy of seawater - waves or currents for instance -  to produce electricity or heat.

Ocean energy systems are still at an early stage of development, with a number of prototype wave and tidal current devices being explored. The theoretical potential for ocean energy easily exceeds present human energy requirements.

Bioenergy is produced from a variety of organic materials, called biomass, such as wood, charcoal, dung and other manures for heat and power production, and agricultural crops for liquid biofuels. Most biomass is used in rural areas for cooking, lighting and space heating, generally by poorer populations in developing countries.

Modern biomass systems include dedicated crops or trees, residues from agriculture and forestry, and various organic waste streams.

Energy created by burning biomass creates greenhouse gas emissions, but at lower levels than burning fossil fuels like coal, oil or gas. However, bioenergy should only be used in limited applications, given potential negative environmental impacts related to large-scale increases in forest and bioenergy plantations, and resulting deforestation and land-use change.

For more information on renewable sources of energy, please check out the following websites:

International Renewable Energy Agency | Renewables

International Energy Agency | Renewables

Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change | Renewable Sources of Energy

UN Environment Programme | Roadmap to a Carbon-Free Future

Sustainable Energy for All | Renewable Energy

Renewable energy – powering a safer future

What is renewable energy and why does it matter? Learn more about why the shift to renewables is our only hope for a brighter and safer world.

Five ways to jump-start the renewable energy transition now

UN Secretary-General outlines five critical actions the world needs to prioritize now to speed up the global shift to renewable energy.

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Renewable and nonrenewable energy sources

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• Nonrenewable energy sources are those that are consumed faster than they can be replaced. Nonrenewable energy sources include nuclear energy as well as fossil fuels such as coal, crude oil, and natural gas. These energy sources have a finite supply, and often emit harmful pollutants into the environment.
• Renewable energy sources are those that are naturally replenished on a relatively short timescale. Renewable energy sources include solar, wind, hydropower, geothermal energy, and biomass fuels. These energy sources are sustainable and generate fewer greenhouse gas emissions than fossil fuels.

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Decarbonization in the oil and gas sector: the role of power purchase agreements and renewable energy certificates.

1. Introduction

2. strategies for decarbonization, 2.1. power purchase agreements and renewable energy certificates for decarbonization, 2.2. alternative low-carbon strategies, 2.3. emission reduction targets and decarbonization challenges, 2.4. upstream operations and low-carbon diversification strategies, 3. methodology.

• Formulation of Research Questions: The research commenced with a clear formulation of four specific research questions, derived from the initial study’s rationale, as outlined in the Introduction section. These questions are intended to explore various aspects of decarbonization strategies among major oil and gas companies.
• Selection of Companies: We selected 21 major oil and gas companies based on their geographical location across Europe, North America, and South America, and on a minimum market capitalization of €10 billion (according to [ 65 ]). This criterion was chosen to ensure that the companies had sufficient public data available for analysis.
• Data Collection: We conducted a thorough search of publicly available annual financial reports, sustainability reports, press releases, and other relevant publications from the chosen companies. The search specifically targeted gathering data pertinent to the formulated research questions.
• Data Recording and Synthesis: All collected data were systematically recorded and organized into tables to facilitate direct comparison across different companies and to align with the specific research questions. This approach enabled a structured analysis and synthesis of the data.
• Analysis and Conclusion Drawing: The final stage involved a detailed analysis of the compiled data to identify key trends, similarities, and divergences in the decarbonization strategies of the selected companies. The findings from this analysis were then synthesized to draw meaningful conclusions regarding the current state and future directions of decarbonization efforts within the sector.

4.1. European Oil and Gas Companies

4.2. north and south american oil and gas companies, 4.3. comparative overview, 5. conclusions, 5.1. theoretical contribution, 5.2. managerial implications, 5.3. societal implications, 5.4. limitations and future directions, author contributions, institutional review board statement, informed consent statement, data availability statement, conflicts of interest.

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Share and Cite

Chrysikopoulos, S.K.; Chountalas, P.T.; Georgakellos, D.A.; Lagodimos, A.G. Decarbonization in the Oil and Gas Sector: The Role of Power Purchase Agreements and Renewable Energy Certificates. Sustainability 2024 , 16 , 6339. https://doi.org/10.3390/su16156339

Chrysikopoulos SK, Chountalas PT, Georgakellos DA, Lagodimos AG. Decarbonization in the Oil and Gas Sector: The Role of Power Purchase Agreements and Renewable Energy Certificates. Sustainability . 2024; 16(15):6339. https://doi.org/10.3390/su16156339

Chrysikopoulos, Stamatios K., Panos T. Chountalas, Dimitrios A. Georgakellos, and Athanasios G. Lagodimos. 2024. "Decarbonization in the Oil and Gas Sector: The Role of Power Purchase Agreements and Renewable Energy Certificates" Sustainability 16, no. 15: 6339. https://doi.org/10.3390/su16156339

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Why Is the Oil Industry Booming?

High prices and growing demand have helped U.S. oil producers take in record profits despite global efforts to spur greater use of renewable energy and electric cars.

• Share full article

By Rebecca F. Elliott

Photographs by Desiree Rios

Reporting from Midland, Texas

For all of the focus on an energy transition, the American oil industry is booming, extracting more crude than ever from the shale rock that runs beneath the ground in West Texas.

After years of losing money on horizontal drilling and hydraulic fracturing, the companies that have helped the United States become the leading global oil producer have turned a financial corner and are generating robust profits. The stocks of some oil and gas companies, such as Exxon Mobil and Diamondback Energy, are at or near record levels.

The industry’s revival after bruising losses during the Covid-19 pandemic is due largely to market forces, though Russia’s war in Ukraine has helped. U.S. oil prices have averaged around $80 a barrel since early 2021, compared with roughly $53 in the four years before that.

That the price and demand for oil have been so strong suggests that the shift to renewable energy and electric vehicles will take longer and be more bumpy than some climate activists and world leaders once hoped.

Oil companies’ success is not just the result of higher prices. Under pressure from Wall Street to improve financial returns, the companies that survived the 2020 oil-price crash generally ditched the debt-fueled growth strategy that had propelled the American shale boom.

Many pared spending and cut costs by laying off workers and automating more of their operations.

Since 2021, oil and gas wells in the lower 48 states have generated more than $485 billion in free cash flow, the money left over after spending on operations and new projects, according to estimates by Rystad Energy, a research and consulting firm. In the decade prior, the industry spent nearly $140 billion more than it took in.

How the Oil and Gas Industry

Became Flush With Cash

As the price of oil has recovered from

a multidecade low in 2020 …

Price of oil, plotted

monthly through June,

adjusted for inflation

… U.S. production has reached anew highs …

million barrels a day

U.S. field crude oil production,

plotted monthly through April

… helping to generate a lot more

cash for the industry.

Free cash flow generated

by oil and gas wells in the

lower 48 states.

How the Oil and Gas Industry Became Flush With Cash

As the price of oil has recovered

from a multidecade low in 2020 …

Price of oil, plotted monthly

through June, adjusted for inflation

… U.S. production has reached new highs …

… helping to generate a lot more cash for the industry.

Free cash flow generated by oil

and gas wells in the lower 48 states.

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China is installing the wind and solar equivalent of five large nuclear power stations per week

Science China is installing the wind and solar equivalent of five large nuclear power stations per week

China is installing record amounts of solar and wind, while scaling back once-ambitious plans for nuclear.

While Australia is falling behind its renewables installation targets, China may meet its end-of-2030 target by the end of this month, according to a report.

What's next?

Energy experts are looking to China, the world's largest emitter and once a climate villain, for lessons on how to rapidly decarbonise.

While Australia debates the merits of going nuclear and frustration grows over the slower-than-needed rollout of solar and wind power, China is going all in on renewables.

New figures show the pace of its clean energy transition is roughly the equivalent of installing five large-scale nuclear power plants worth of renewables every week.

A report by Sydney-based think tank Climate Energy Finance (CEF) said China was installing renewables so rapidly it would meet its end-of-2030 target by the end of this month — or 6.5 years early.

It's installing at least 10 gigawatts of wind and solar generation capacity every fortnight.

By comparison, experts have said the Coalition's plan to build seven nuclear power plants would add fewer than 10GW of generation capacity to the grid sometime after 2035.

Energy experts are looking to China, the world's largest emitter, once seen as a climate villain, for lessons on how to go green, fast.

"We've seen America under President Biden throw a trillion dollars on the table [for clean energy]," CEF director Tim Buckley said.

"China's response to that has been to double down and go twice as fast."

Smart Energy Council CEO John Grimes, who recently returned from a Shanghai energy conference, said China has decarbonised its grid almost as quickly as Australia, despite having a much harder task due to the scale of its energy demand.

"They have clear targets and every part of their government is harnessed to deliver the plan," he said.

China accounts for about a third of the world's greenhouse gas emissions. A recent drop in emissions (the first since relaxing COVID-19 restrictions), combined with the decarbonisation of the power grid, may mean the country's emissions have peaked.

"With the power sector going green, emissions are set to plateau and then progressively fall towards 2030 and beyond," CEF China energy policy analyst Xuyang Dong said.

So how is China building and connecting panels so fast, and what's the role of nuclear in its transition?

Like building solar farms near Perth to power Sydney

Because its large cities of the eastern seaboard are dominated by apartment buildings, China hasn't seen an uptake of rooftop solar like in Australia.

To find space for all the solar panels and wind turbines required for the nation's energy needs, the planners of China's energy transition have looked west, to areas like the Gobi Desert.

The world's largest solar and wind farms are being built on the western edge of the country and connected to the east via the world's longest high-voltage transmission lines.

These lines are so long they could span the length of our continent.

In Australian terms, it's the equivalent of using solar panels near Perth to power homes in Sydney.

Mr Buckley said China's approach was similar to the Australian one of developing regional "renewable energy zones" for large-scale electricity generation.

"They're doing what Australia is doing with renewable energy zones but they're doing it on steroids," he said.

What about 'firming' the grid?

One of the issues with switching a grid to intermittent renewables is ensuring a steady supply of power.

In technical terms, this is the difference between generation capacity (measured in gigawatts) and actual energy output (measured in gigawatt-hours, or generation over time).

Renewables have a "capacity factor" (the ratio of actual output to maximum potential generation) of about 25 per cent, whereas nuclear's is as high as 90 per cent.

So although China is installing solar and wind generation equivalent to five large nuclear power plants per week, their output is closer to one nuclear plant per week.

Renewables account for more than half of installed capacity in China, but only amount to about one-fifth of actual energy output over a year, the CEF's Tim Buckley said.

To "firm" or stabilise the supply of power from its renewable energy zones, China is using a mix of pumped hydro and battery storage, similar to Australia.

"They're installing 1GW per month of pumped hydro storage," Mr Buckley said.

"We're struggling to build the 2GW Snowy 2.0 in 10 years."

There are some major differences between Australia's and China's approaches, though.

Somewhat counterintuitively, China has built dozens of coal-fired power stations alongside its renewable energy zones, to maintain the pace of its clean energy transition.

China was responsible for 95 per cent of the world's new coal power construction activity last year.

The new plants are partly needed to meet demand for electricity, which has gone up as more energy-hungry sectors of the economy, like transport, are electrified.

The coal-fired plants are also being used, like the batteries and pumped hydro, to provide a stable supply of power down the transmission lines from renewable energy zones, balancing out the intermittent solar and wind.

Despite these new coal plants, coal's share of total electricity generation in the country is falling.

The China Energy Council estimated renewables generation would overtake coal by the end of this year.

The CEF's Xuyang Dong said despite the country's reliance on coal, "having China go green at this speed and scale provides the world with a textbook to do the same".

"China is installing every week the equivalent of what we're doing every year."

Despite this speed, China wasn't installing renewables fast enough to meet its 2060 carbon neutrality target, she added.

"According to our analysis, [the current rate of installation] is not ambitious enough for China."

What about nuclear?

China is building new nuclear plants, although nowhere near as fast as it once intended.

In 2011, Chinese authorities announced fission reactors would become the foundation of the country's electricity generation system in the next "10 to 20 years".

But Japan's 2011 Fukushima disaster prompted a moratorium on inland nuclear plants, which have to use river water for cooling and are more vulnerable to frequent flooding.

Meanwhile, over the following decade, solar became the cheapest electricity in the world.

From 2010 to 2020, the installed cost of utility-scale solar PV declined by 81 per cent on a global average basis.

As well as cheap, it was safe, which made solar farms quicker to build than nuclear reactors.

Instead of nuclear, solar is now intended to be the foundation of China's new electricity generation system.

Authorities have steadily downgraded plans for nuclear to dominate China's energy generation. At present, the goal is 18 per cent of generation by 2060.

China installed 1GW of nuclear last year, compared to 300GW of solar and wind, Mr Buckley said.

"That says they're all in on renewables.

"They had grand plans for nuclear to be massive but they're behind on nuclear by a decade and five years ahead of schedule on solar and wind."

How is China transitioning so fast?

In June of this year, on the eve of the Coalition's nuclear policy announcement, former Queensland Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk, who's now a Smart Energy Council "international ambassador", led a delegation of Australians to the world's largest clean energy conference in Shanghai.

The annual Smart Energy Conference hosts more than 600,000 delegates across three days.

Its scale underlines China's increasing dominance of the global clean energy economy and, for some attendees, prompted unenviable comparisons with Australia's progress.

Mr Buckley, who was part of the delegation, said he was "blown away".

"China is winning this race."

John Grimes, the Smart Energy Council CEO who also attended, said Australia could learn from the Chinese government's ability to execute a long-term, difficult and costly transition plan, rather than relying on market forces to find a solution.

"Australia's transition is going too slow, there was a lost decade of action," he said.

"The world today spends about $7 trillion a year on coal, gas and oil and that money is going to find a new home.

"Who is going to be the economic winner in that global economic transition? It's going to be China."

He and other energy experts are frustrated with the progress of Australia's transition, including the discussion of nuclear power and the "weaponisation of dissent" from community groups over new wind farms and transmission lines .

Stephanie Bashir, CEO of the Nexa energy advisory, said Australia's transition was tangled in red tape.

"The key hold-up for a lot of projects is the slow planning approvals," Ms Bashir, who also attended the conference, said.

"In China they decide they're going to do something and then they go and do it."

The Australian Energy Market Operator's (AEMO) plan to decarbonise the grid and ensure the lights stay on when the coal-fired power stations close requires thousands of kilometres of new transmission lines and large-scale solar and wind farms.

Australia is installing about half the amount of renewables per year required under the plan.

Due to this shortfall, many experts say it's unlikely to meet its 2030 target of 82 per cent renewables in the grid and 43 per cent emissions reduction.

"We need to build 6GW each year from now until each power station closes, and so far we're only bringing online 3GW," Ms Bashir said.

"If we identify some projects are nation-building … and we need them for transition, we just have to get on with it."

Mr Buckley predicted China would accelerate its deployment of renewables.

"My forecast is it will lift 20 per cent per annum on current levels."

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Vietnam allows big companies to buy clean energy directly to meet their climate targets

This photo shows power lines in Hanoi, Vietnam, Tuesday, July 9, 2024. Vietnam will let electricity-guzzling factories buy electricity from wind and solar power producers, helping big companies like Samsung Electronics meet their climate targets and relieving pressure on the country’s overstrained grid. (AP Photo/Hau Dinh)

FILE - Solar panels work near wind turbines in Quy Non, Vietnam, June 11, 2023. (AP Photo/Minh Hoang, File)

This photo shows a building with a Samsung logo in Hanoi, Vietnam, Tuesday, July 9, 2024. Vietnam will let electricity-guzzling factories buy electricity from wind and solar power producers, helping big companies like Samsung Electronics meet their climate targets and relieving pressure on the country’s overstrained grid. (AP Photo/Hau Dinh)

This photo shows power lines in Hanoi, Vietnam, Tuesday, July 9, 2024. (AP Photo/Hau Dinh)

FILE - Solar panels work in Quy Non, Vietnam, June 11, 2023. (AP Photo/Minh Hoang, File)

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HANOI, Vietnam (AP) — Vietnam will let electricity-guzzling factories buy electricity from wind and solar power producers, helping big companies like Samsung Electronics meet their climate targets and relieving pressure on the country’s overstrained grid.

The government decree allowing Direct Power Purchase Agreements, or DPPAs, was approved earlier this month. It lifts a regulation requiring all consumers of power to rely only on the state-run utility Vietnam Electricity, or EVN, and its subsidiaries, which distribute electricity at rates fixed by the government.

Foreign investors that are vital to Vietnam’s ascent as a major exporter had been clamoring for such a change.

“The DPPA will dramatically alter this status quo,” said Giles Cooper, a partner at the international law firm Allens based in Hanoi who specializes in energy policy.

Without such a change, it was “difficult, if not impossible” for companies to meet their commitments to phase out reliance on fossil fuels. With more and more countries taxing carbon pollution, companies that can show that their factories use clean energy can enjoy a “considerable competitive advantage” in some markets, said Cooper, who contributed to the drafting of the law.

This loosening of the Communist Party-ruled state’s grip on the sale of electricity has been in the making since 2019. In most of Southeast Asia, electricity markets tend to be centralized. But DPPAs to allow companies to buy energy from power producers directly are increasing, said Kyeongho Lee, head of Asia Pacific Power Research at Wood Mackenzie.

Lee said the amount of power generation under such agreements increased from 15 gigawatts in 2021 to 26 gigawatts in 2023, growth concentrated in India, Australia and Taiwan, which account for more than 80% of the total capacity that is under contract.

Vietnam’s move addresses investors’ concerns about access to stable and clean energy. That’s a priority for a country seen as a promising alternative for businesses looking to diversify supply chains outside China.

Liberalizing the market also is expected to spur more construction of new solar and wind farms by guaranteeing a market for clean electricity, analysts say.

About 20 large companies are interested in buying clean energy directly from producers, according to a survey conducted by Vietnam’s Ministry of Industry and Trade, with total demand estimated at nearly 1 gigawatt of energy.

Vietnam’s largest foreign investor, Samsung, was among the earliest to start working with the government on introducing this mechanism. The company aims to transition all its business sites to renewable energy by 2027, and Vietnam is its largest mobile phone manufacturing base, accounting for more than half of all production.

The South Korean multinational told The Associated Press in an email that it welcomed the approval of the “landmark decree.”

Its factories transitioned to renewable energy in 2022 by buying renewable energy credits. “Now, with the DPPA mechanism, we have more options to procure renewable energy and look forward to working with the Vietnam government to further develop and implement PPAs,” it said.

Apple Inc., which has moved some manufacturing to Vietnam from China after enduring disruptions in its production during the COVID-19 pandemic, also welcomed the reform as an “important step towards a cleaner grid.”

Bessma Aljarbou, head of Apple’s Supplier Carbon Solutions said in a statement that the plan provides suppliers with a “meaningful opportunity” to support Vietnam’s goal of becoming carbon neutral by 2050 while meeting its own goal of becoming carbon neutral by 2030.

The success of DPPAs will depend on how quickly Vietnam can upgrade its rickety electrical grid, which as is in the case in many places in the world , has failed to keep up with rapid growth of clean power generation. Vietnam says it needs $15 billion to strengthen it.

This could be an obstacle for factories where it is impossible to build a solar or wind farm close by, meaning that companies can only buy clean power “virtually,” buying the energy from the state utility, EVN, which would purchase the power from the solar or wind farm, with the buyer making up any difference in costs between the government rate and the one agreed on in the purchasing agreement.

“In this model, there is no direct link between the consumer and generator. In fact, they can be hundreds of kilometers apart,” explained Cooper, adding that even though the company still buys electricity from the state-run utility it now has contractual evidence of its use of renewable energy.

The new directive has two mechanisms for factories to directly buy renewable energy. The first is the so-called direct wire model where some large consumers of electricity can be connected to a nearby renewable power plant through a direct transmission line. They can then buy the electricity at an agreed-upon rate. This ensures the power will be entirely clean energy with no involvement of EVN.

Vietnam increased its use of solar and wind power by tenfold between 2015-23 and power from such clean sources now accounts for about 13% of total electricity generation. But the clean energy boom has faltered in recent months due to policy hurdles like the removal of attractive long-term contracts for clean energy producers or lack of protections for losses incurred when energy from the sun or the wind aren’t utilized to balance the grid. These were further aggravated by political uncertainty due to an anti-corruption campaign.

Meanwhile use of polluting fossil fuels, which had been on the decline, increased to 53.6% of total power generation in 2023 from 49.7% the year before, according to data from U.K. based energy thinktank Ember.

The new directive could help reverse this trend by making it easier for energy producers since it guarantees that there will be purchasers for specific wind and solar projects, said Dinita Setyawati Senior Electricity Policy Analyst for Southeast Asia at Ember. “So there are more certainties from a business point of view,” she said.

She added that in Vietnam the law could “unlock” a lot of interest to build solar or wind farms.

“We can expect more renewable energy capacities installed if this scheme is successful,” she said.

Renewable power demand will triple in the next 7 years amid AI boom, energy CEO says

• NextEra Energy's CEO said renewable power demand is set to triple in the coming year.
• The company added 3,000 megawatts of renewables and storage projects last quarter.
• The company is working to meet power demand from the AI sector that's projected to grow threefold.

As artificial intelligence booms, renewable power demand is set to soar, NextEra Energy Inc.'s CEO John Ketchum said.

Demand for renewable energy will likely triple in the next seven years compared to the previous seven, Ketchum said during the company's earnings call Wednesday.

NextEra is working toward meeting that demand, the company said. Last quarter, the company added 3,000 megawatts of renewables and storage projects, almost doubling its existing renewables portfolio, bringing the total renewable power generation to seven gigawatts.

Almost a third of that is going toward an agreement to power Google's data centers, which the company is investing heavily in to expand its AI capabilities. Google parent Alphabet has said it plans to invest over $100 billion to further its AI ambitions.

"As data center growth accelerates to facilitate our economy shift to artificial intelligence and as we continue to re-domesticate and electrify across multiple centers, our nation must embrace an all-of-the-above strategy to meet increasing electric demand," Ketchum said on the call.

"These results support our belief that the bulk of the growth demand will be met by a combination of new renewables and battery storage," Ketchum said. He argues for an "all-of-the-above strategy" to meet the electric demand, with renewables and storage leading the way because they are cheaper and faster to deploy than their competitors.

That low cost and relative speed "keep power prices down, making our economy more competitive globally," Ketchum said.

The company also owns a natural gas fleet, but Ketchum says natural gas is at the will of fuel price fluctuations and therefore more expensive in many states.

NextEra shares are up 23% in 2024, trading at about $74.80 at 10:20 a.m. ET on Thursday.

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• 25 July 2024

India budget: Modi bets big on nuclear energy and space

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The Indian government wants to expand the country’s space economy fivefold in the next 10 years. Credit: Indranil Mukherjee/AFP via Getty

India’s latest annual budget, the first since Prime Minister Narendra Modi was re-elected for a third term , offers a big push for renewable and nuclear energy, plus extra money to support the country's burgeoning space industry. The government announced plans to work with the private sector to set up small nuclear reactors and develop nuclear technologies in the quest for energy security.

Finance minister Nirmala Sitharaman, who presented the 2024–25 budget in the Indian parliament on 23 July, said nuclear energy would “form a very significant part of the energy mix” for India’s development. The government also plans to pursue research on small modular reactors, with parts that can be assembled in a factory and transported to the installation site. The exact funds for the nuclear energy plans have not been specified.

The budget commitments for science played out as many researchers expected, with funding announcements for areas of national pride and applied science .

India’s space department will receive 10 billion rupees (US$120 million) to set up a venture-capital fund to support projects that will expand the country’s space economy fivefold in the next 10 years; overall, the department will receive $156 million, a 4% increase on the 2023–24 budget.

Sitharaman also announced that the Anusandhan National Research Foundation (ANRF) will become operational. The aim of the foundation, first announced in 2019, is to boost funding for university research and to broaden the scope of that research. The ANRF hopes to attract private-sector funding and distribute large grants from a considerable pool of roughly $11 billion.

The combined allocations for key ministries and departments engaged in research — science and technology; agricultural research; atomic energy; earth sciences; health research; new and renewable energy; and space — is $7.1 billion, a 20% increase on the 2023–24 budget. But much of the increase will go to the ministry of new and renewable energy, whose allocation has almost doubled to $2.28 billion in 2024–25 compared with what it was in 2023–2024.

Welcome boost

Heads of key science departments under the ministry of science and technology welcomed the ANRF becoming operational, as well as the new venture-capital fund for the space department and research on climate-resilient agriculture. “Research and development efforts in India are primarily academia-centric, and most often the innovations that occur at the laboratory level fail to get commercialized,” says Rajesh Gokhale, secretary of the department of biotechnology under India’s ministry of science and technology in New Delhi. ANRF funding for basic research and prototype development will pave the way for private-sector-driven research and innovation, he adds.

Geneticist Tapasya Srivastava at the University of Delhi South Campus expects that Sitharaman’s emphasis on employment generation and the internship scheme, a highlight of the budget, will help science students to find work at private companies. In the long run, she says, this will “encourage students to take up science as a career, with more opportunities beyond academia”.

But others were less impressed. “What is important is not the funds promised in the budget, but the quantum actually released during the year, which is typically less than the promise,” says geneticist Subhash Lakhotia at Banaras Hindu University in Varanasi. “The amount actually available to individual researchers in real terms is relatively reduced, due to inflation, enhanced emoluments and the increasing numbers of researchers competing for the limited money.”

India spent 0.64% of its gross domestic product (GDP) on research and development during 2020–2021. That compares with an average of 2.7% in the 38 high-income countries in the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development in 2022, and with China’s 2.4% in 2021.

Lakhotia doubted whether the money for research this year would increase India’s investment in research as a percentage of GDP.

C. P. Rajendran, a geologist at the National Institute of Advanced Studies in Bengaluru, agrees. “The budget allocation for science in India continues to be dull with some nominal increase,” he says. “There is nothing much to be excited about.”

doi: https://doi.org/10.1038/d41586-024-02370-0

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