Developing nations driving investment in solar

Initially, investment in solar was driven by developed countries, especially Germany.  Solar was much more expensive than fossil fuels, and needed subsidies to get it installed.  Only rich countries could afford that.  But as the cost of solar fell, ever larger percentages of new solar worldwide were installed in developing countries.  In most places now, the total cost of the electricity generated from a newly constructed solar farm is close to or below the cost of electricity from a new coal plant. In a few years, the total cost of new solar will be below the operating cost of coal.  Since building a new coal power station will take 5 years or more, it's becoming obvious that by the time a new coal power station is completed it will be more expensive than coal,  because the costs of solar continue to fall fast, and solar farms can be constructed much more quickly than coal power stations. 

Meanwhile, Germany, which has the highest solar capacity per capita (ironic given its climate), is experiencing a bit of renewables fatigue.  Subsidies are being reduced, and Germans feel that they have done a lot to push the world towards green electricity and maybe it's time for others to do their bit too.  Which they are.  The chart below shows that installed capacity in the Asia-Pacific region is now greater than in Europe.  It's also growing much faster.  And that's driven  by four things:

• most importantly, cost
• energy independence
• wanting to dominate new industries 
• air pollution

Source:CarbonBrief

Today solar produces just 1.3% of the world's electricity.  But that is growing by 30% plus each year, which means that it will rise 4 fold every 5 years.  So in 5 years, it should reach 5.2%, in 10 years 20.8% and in 15 years 80%.  Of course, it won't reach 80%--we'll have wind, hydro, nuclear and some biomass in there as well, so solar will probably peak out at 50 or 60%.  But the point is this: although over the next few years the rise in solar will be slow in absolute terms, by the mid 2020s, carbon emissions from coal will be falling precipitously.  The decline won't be linear, it will look like the trajectory of a projectile, falling faster and faster until it hits the ground.  It's likely, in other words, that by 2030 there will be no coal power stations left.  And that won't be driven just by developed countries, but mostly by developing countries.  Ironic, isn't it, that just a few years ago you could blame China for doing nothing about global warming, yet now we expect China, India, Mexico etc to be the key movers in our transition to a carbon-free economy.

This is why I usually feel really confident that we will save our planet from catastrophic global warming.  Not because of our good nature, or because we sacrifice things for the common good, or because we care about our long term future, but because renewables and batteries are going to get irresistibly cheap.   Trump, the troglodytes in the Republican Party and "Liberal" party in Australia, will be defeated by engineering, technology and cost.  They may delay the revolution  by a couple of years, but they will be impotent to stop it.  It's happening outside their control anyway, in China and India and Mexico and Chile and Germany and everywhere, even in the US, where utility executives are ignoring the rants from Washington and installing wind and solar because it improves the bottom line.

The chart came from this informative piece by Zeke Hausfather at CarbonBrief.  Lots of nice interactive charts, full of useful information.