nuclear-news

Figure 1: Renewables, no longer for hippies!

The latest Renewable energy global status report is out, which reveals that 147 GW’s of new renewable generating capacity was added last year. I haven’t had a chance to crunch the numbers, but that’s probably a enough capacity to generate a good 600 TWh/yr worth of energy generating capacity.

Figure 2: Growth in renewables 2015 [Source: REN 2016 Report]

This includes 50 GW’s of new solar panels and 62 GW’s of wind turbines. Solar thermal has also continued to grow strongly, with 26 GW’s added. Biofuels production is now at a level of 120 billion litres of fuel produced a year, equivalent to roughly 2.5 million bbl/day of oil production (i.e. a fairly large oil field!).

Figure 3: Average growth rates in different renewables last year and the 5 year average [Source: REN 2016 Report]

In short, what the report is saying is…