From 2025, renewable energy sources such as wind and solar power will have replaced coal as the world’s main producer of electricity. In the year of the corona pandemic, the amount of green electricity will increase at “record speed”, forecasts the World Energy Agency (IEA) in its published annual report. IEA head Fatih Birol called on governments to continue promoting renewable energies. According to the IEA report, the capacity of wind, solar and hydroelectric power plants will reach a new record of 200 gigawatts this year, mainly due to strong expansion in the USA and China.

This development will accelerate in 2021 – also because projects that had been put on hold due to the corona crisis will then be realised. The Energy Agency expects capacities to increase by ten percent. The boom will be particularly noticeable in the EU and India. In 2023, more electricity will be generated from sun and wind than with natural gas, the IEA predicts. In 2024, renewable energies will then overtake coal. “In 2025 renewables will become the world’s most important energy sources, ending five decades in which coal was at the top,” Birol said. “They will then supply one third of the world’s electricity.”