Despite a few recent success stories, clean-energy progress is falling well short of the levels needed to limit the global increase in temperatures to no more than 2 degrees Celsius, International Energy Agency (IEA) announced according to a report, which examined progress in the development and deployment of key clean energy technologies.
The report was presented this week at the Clean Energy Ministerial (CEM) meeting in Mexico, which
is a global forum to share best practices and promote policies and programs that encourage and facilitate the transition to a global clean energy economy.
The report says that while renewable power generation continues to progress, the number of electric vehicles (EVs) is still increasing rapidly, and a significant milestone for carbon capture and storage (CCS) was reached in 2014, the deployment rate of clean energy technologies is no longer on track to meet the 2-degree scenario targets.
Overall, the growth rates of clean energy technologies have slowed significantly and existing opportunities for deployment are not being exploited, preventing significant benefits from being realized. Policy certainty, incentives, regulation and international co-operation are required to meet stated ambitions and transform the global energy system.
The report notes that clean energy progress is being overshadowed by the expansion of inefficient coal-fired power generation.
"Low-priced coal was the fastest-growing fossil fuel in 2013, and coal-fired generation increased in all regions," the report says. "Newer coal plants can perform to a relatively high standard. But where coal-fired capacity is expanding, in emerging economies for example, less efficient, subcritical units dominate, primarily due to the absence of minimum efficiency policies."
