“Solar power has become the engine of the global energy transition,” Phil MacDonald, a managing director at Ember, said in a statement accompanying the think tank’s latest report. A decade of record advancement was underway when he said this, but his words couldn’t ring truer of today in an age when clean electricity sources now comprise more than 40% of world power generation, a new peak since the 1940s. This milestone exemplifies the rising supremacy of solar energy, which provided a record 474 terawatt-hours (TWh), or 40% of the annual increase in global electricity demand in 2024.
The numbers are staggering. Global solar generation hit 2,131 TWh last year, having doubled in output in just three years. China produced by far the most with a staggering 834 TWh of solar electricity, accounting for 39% of global production. And in the meantime the European Union (EU) rose to solar superpower ranks, producing 71% of its electricity from clean energy nearly half of its energy consumption coming from solar, wind and hydro. “Europe has cemented a global leadership in clean power,” Dr. Beatrice Petrovich, a senior analyst at Ember, told Euronews Green.
Thanks to an already-discontinued incentive program for small solar systems, Hungary now leads the world when it comes to solar in its electricity mix, at 25 percent. Spain was not far behind, recording the continent’s biggest annual increase in TWh for solar generation at 10 TWh.
California, in contrast, is leading the way for solar plus battery storage. California’s energy storage capacity has skyrocketed from 770 MW four years ago to over 6,600 MW today, and the end of the year could see it exceeding 8,500 MW. This solar-plus-storage pairing ve proven key to grid stability, particularly in the peak-demand evening periods when solar generation drops sharply. Governor Gavin Newsom’s energy roadmap has the state achieving 100 percent clean electricity by 2045 and battery storage is a key part of the calculation. Initiatives like the California Energy Commission’s Demand Side Grid Support have already emerged from this trend, mimicking consumer-owned battery systems that reduce reliance on fossil fuels and enhance reliability.
The EU and California have been global leaders on clean energy and offer lessons for the transition worldwide. Europe’s policymakers are thus focused on getting more renewables online, while also ensuring that grid modernization can keep up with newly added intermittent sources of energy as solar and wind. “We have the world’s largest grid. Now we need to make it smarter,” said Petrovich, who pointed to energy storage, electrification and grid upgrades. California’s model, in the meantime, offers a blueprint for how to scale solar-plus-storage deployments. The Edwards & Sanborn project, consisting of 875 MW of solar and 3,287 MWh of battery storage, illustrates the capacity for large-scale facilities to not only enable grid reliability, but also the client’s ability to decarbonize GHG emissions.
Things however have progressed further so far. In 2024, global power-sector emissions reached their highest ever at 14.6 billion tonnes of CO2, driven up by heatwaves which drove electricity demand for cooling. In India, for example, coal generation contributed to 64% of growth in electrical demand on the country’s hottest day on record. Yet even in regions that depend on fossil fuels, the shift to cleaner energy is moving in the right direction. India, now the world’s third-largest maker of electricity from wind and solar, is likely to be powered by 170 terawatt-hours (TWh) of solar when the numbers are settled, having only added 20 TWh of (this) generation by solar alone.
Emerging technologies like artificial intelligence, data centers and electric vehicles are spurring more electricity consumption. Ember’s analysis suggests the increase in clean power is happening quickly enough to satisfy this expanding demand provided countries maintain the flow of investments in efficient appliances, smart grids and renewable capacity. Solar generation, the I.E.A. forecasts, will jump an average 21 percent a year through 2030, while wind will grow 13 percent.
Solar prices have fallen over 90% since 2010 due to rapid world-wide deployment. Among other countries to adopt imports of Chinese-manufactured solar panels are Saudi Arabia and Pakistan, a demonstration of the technology’s scalability and affordability. “Paired with battery storage, solar is set to be an unstoppable force.” in MacDonald’s handy glossary.
The energy transition is not a question of whether it is a question of how fast it will occur globally. But the world runs largely on clean electricity. Europe’s countries and California are ahead of most of the world. As Petrovich hopefully put it, “Every country is in a position to match increased demand with clean electricity.” The challenge now is to make it happen faster and balance out the downsides of climate change, geopolitical tensions and tech integration.
