Investment in clean energy must triple by 2030 if the world hopes to effectively combat global warming and avoid energy price volatility, the International Energy Agency (IEA) said on October 13. The Paris-based agency said the world is not investing enough to meet future energy consumption in sustainable ways. The IEA added that the upcoming COP26 climate summit in Glasgow in November would be the first test of the world’s readiness to set up more ambitious commitments under the Paris Accord.
In its World Energy Outlook published earlier this year, the IEA predicts that renewables will contribute to over two-thirds of investment in new power capacity in 2021. However, the world is expected to see the largest annual increase in CO2 emissions due to the higher consumption of fossil fuels.
Under the agency’s Net Zero Emissions by 2050 (NZE) scenario, the share of fossil fuels in the world’s energy supply should fall from nearly 80% in 2020 to below 25%, while that of renewables should increase from just 12% to more than two-thirds over the same period. Under the Stated Policies Scenario (STEPS), the IEA projects that the global temperatures would increase by 2.6 degrees Celsius by 2100 if the world did not adopt more ambitious measures.
