India's power-sector emissions flat

 

From Carbon Brief

A surge in clean energy has kept carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions in check across India’s power sector, with no growth from the first half of 2024 to the same period in 2026.

This is the first time in more than 50 years that there has been no growth in India’s coal power over a two-year period, even as electricity demand grew overall.

At the same time, both oil and gas consumption have fallen across the nation for two years in a row, helping alleviate the shock of the Hormuz crisis.

Nevertheless, the new six-monthly analysis for Carbon Brief shows that India’s [total] emissions grew by 3.7% year-on-year in the first half of 2026, due to increases from steel, cement and other sectors.

Other key findings for the first half of 2026 include:

• India’s power-sector emissions flatlined at 2024 levels, after a 2.2% decline in the first half of 2025 and a 2.3% rise in the same period this year.
• Clean energy met all of the 7% rise in India’s electricity demand over the two years, adding 63 terawatt hours (TWh), equivalent to the total demand of Switzerland.
• India has added 77 gigawatts (GW) of solar in this two-year period, helping meet 60% of the rise in electricity demand overall.
• While fossil-fuel generation stagnated, generators added 8.5GW of new coal capacity, leading to fewer running hours and increased costs to electricity consumers.
• CO2 emissions from oil and gas fell by 7% year-on-year, extending a reduction that began in 2025, despite higher demand for road transport fuels.
• Steel and cement emissions grew by 8% year-on-year, reaching a 23% share of India’s total CO2 in the first half of 2026.

If the pace of India’s clean-energy expansion is to continue, it will need to upgrade its electricity grid, rapidly build out energy storage and boost the flexibility of coal power.

While clean-energy expansion is covering most or all of India’s power-demand growth, the fossil-fuel industry continues to pursue major capital investments.

This includes large amounts of new coal-power capacity, ambitious plans for the conversion of coal-to-chemicals and efforts to boost domestic coking coal production for the steel sector.

While CO2 output from the power sector is flat, with oil and gas in decline, India’s emissions still went up due to the contribution from industry.

India lags behind its competitors – including most large emerging economies – when it comes to electrifying its industrial sector.

Faster progress would enable clean electricity to substitute for fossil fuels in industry, as well as for power, offering the potential for India to cut its emissions overall.

[Read more here] 

 As you can see from the top chart, India's power-sector emissions have risen steadily for over 50 years, as you would expect from a rapidly growing economy.  The last time India's emissions from the power sector fell was during Covid.  This time, they've fallen at a time when India's economic growth rate has been high.   A peak in these emissions makes a peak in India's total emissions much easier to achieve.

It is striking that the two of the high growth middle-income developing economies, India and China, are on the brink of peak emissions.  Both countries have much lower per capita emissions than the US, with China emitting 9.9 tonnes per person per year, and India just 2.9, compared with the US's 17.5 and Germany's 7.8.  But they are the most populous countries on Earth, and what they do to cut emissions really matters.  So this is good news.

Global fossil fuel emissions to fall in 2026

 From Carbon Brief

Global fossil-fuel emissions are set to fall by around 0.5% in 2026 amid the fallout from the Hormuz crisis, according to Carbon Brief analysis.

The US-Iran war has severely disrupted trade through the strait of Hormuz, causing a spike in oil and gas prices that continues to ripple around the global economy.

Each month of disruption – and each new flashpoint, such as in Yemen – is increasing the incentive to switch to alternatives.

Those alternatives include coal, with the latest forecasts pointing to a 1.2% rise in coal demand this year – apparently supporting media claims of a “return to coal” in the wake of the crisis.

Yet Carbon Brief’s analysis shows the rise in emissions associated with this increased coal use, much of which is unrelated to Hormuz, is set to be more than offset by declines for oil and gas.

The estimated overall impact on carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions from fossil fuels in 2026 is shown in the figure below and amounts to a reduction of around 0.5% from 2025 levels.

(Fossil fuels account for two-thirds of global greenhouse gas emissions.)

The emissions estimates for each fossil fuel are based on the latest forecasts from the International Energy Agency (IEA) for coal, oil and gas, in light of the ongoing global energy crisis.

For example, the agency initially estimated that global coal demand would decline this year. In its 2025 coal report, published in mid-December, it said that declining coal demand in China would outweigh the impact of pro-coal policies under US president Donald Trump.

In contrast, the latest update, published in September 2026, said that global coal demand would rise by 1.2% in 2026, instead of the small decline that had been expected.

The report highlighted the boost to coal demand from higher gas prices in the wake of Hormuz. However, there are limits to this, because few countries can switch from gas to coal at large scale.

The IEA’s latest report also noted the role of a strong El Niño, which is pushing up the need for cooling and depressing hydropower output in key markets. Other short-term factors are also affecting coal demand this year, including a rising amount of “wasted” wind and solar in China.

For gas, the IEA did not initially update its previous forecast that global gas demand would rise by 2.0% in 2026, which had been published in January of this year.

Its most recent forecast – published in July – already pointed to a 0.6% drop in demand in 2026. Since then, pressure on gas demand from high prices has only grown stronger.

For oil, there has been an even more dramatic shift in forecasts since the start of the year.

In its January 2026 oil market report, the IEA forecast a rise in demand in 2026 of 930,000 barrels per day (bpd). As shown in the figure below, this has been steadily revised downwards over the course of the year, as the Hormuz crisis was first ignited – and then extended.

By September, the IEA was forecasting a 2,500,000bpd drop in oil demand in 2026, equivalent to a reduction of 2.4% from 2025 levels.

(A 15 September research note from Morgan Stanley, not available online, found a “consensus” forecast of a 2,415,000bpd drop in demand in 2026.)

 

While there are many short-term factors at play in the shifting forecasts for 2026, it is clear that the latest energy crisis will also affect fossil-fuel demand in the next year and beyond.

For example, whereas the IEA initially forecast that oil demand would rebound in 2027 to well above 2025 levels, it is now expecting use of the fuel to be effectively flat for two years.

This puts a question mark over its previous expectation – published in October last year – that global oil demand would not peak until as late as 2030.

“For every month the conflict lasts, the probability of permanent [oil] demand destruction increases,” wrote Sverre Alvik, vice president at consultancy DNV in a late August analysis.

As fuel prices have surged, electric vehicles (EVs) have captured record shares of major car markets, from Australia and China through to Europe, Indonesia and Thailand.

In July, EV sales nearly doubled year-on-year in “new markets”, noted Alvik, pointing to countries outside China, Europe and North America.

The IEA says the 2027 outlooks for coal and gas are interdependent, with coal demand potentially increasing again if gas prices remain elevated – or dropping back if gas prices ease.

At the same time, governments in countries that had planned to rely on imports of liquefied natural gas (LNG) have been signalling shifts towards favouring domestic clean energy instead – or continuing to use coal for longer.

The current crisis, therefore, has the potential to not only lower fossil-fuel use and emissions in the short term, but also on a more lasting basis.

[Read more from Carbon Brief here]

 

Am I being too optimistic by believing that emissions have peaked?  China's emissions have flattened, and if they sort out their curtailment problem ("wasted" wind and solar) then their emissions will start falling.  The Iran war has created a massive incentive for individuals, companies and governments to switch to renewables.  The US has shown that it is unable to maintain open seas for oil transportation, which means that this disruption is likely to continue, even if there are temporary fluctuations in oil and gas prices, as rumours of peace talk rise and vanish.  At the same time, battery, solar and EV costs will continue to fall, increasing their appeal.  You have to buy oil every day, but cars last 15 years, batteries now last 20+, and solar panels 30+.  A once-off cost gives you free travel and electricity for decades. And, outside the US and China, EVs now have the same "sticker price" as petrol/diesel cars.

The switch will continue even after the Trump administration is history.

Solar capacity outpaces coal in China

 

Source: Our World in Data

From EuroNews

China's solar energy capacity has surpassed that of coal-fired power for the first time ever.

"As of the end of July this year, China's installed solar power capacity reached 1.286 billion kilowatts," China's National Energy Administration (NEA) said.

"For the first time, photovoltaic installed capacity surpassed coal-fired power, becoming the largest power source category in China," it added.

The country's coal-fired power installed capacity, the energy body said, stood at 1.285 billion kilowatts [1,285 GW — a typical coal power station is 1 to 2 GW]

Solar generation rose 15.5 per cent in the first seven months of 2026 compared to the same period last year to 802.4 billion kilowatt-hours, about one-eighth of the country's total, the NEA said in another statement.

China, the world's largest emitter of greenhouse gases that drive climate change, has pledged to peak carbon emissions by 2030 and achieve carbon neutrality by 2060.

The NEA said China's installed solar power capacity and power generation "have maintained a steady trend of rapid growth," with it playing an "increasingly prominent role" in guaranteeing electricity supply and driving the energy transition.

Coal has been China's key power generation source for decades and a key driver of planet-warming emissions.

But the country's coal-fired power generation fell by nearly two per cent in 2025, despite rising energy demand in the world's largest emitter, data reviewed by the AFP news agency showed in February.

It marked the first decline in six years, with some analysts saying it was the first time on record that coal generation dropped at the same time as power demand rose.

China has seen an explosive growth in its renewable installation, with coal's share in its energy mix edging down in recent years.The country installed a record 315 gigawatts of solar power and 119 gigawatts of wind power capacity last year, over 80 per cent of total newly installed power generation capacity, according to the China Electricity Council.

EU countries are trailing behind China when it comes to renewables, partly because China started their transition to clean energy much sooner. [This seems incorrect. China's solar capacity on 2000 was just 0.03 GW, compared with 0.2 GW in Europe and 0.59 GW in the US.  China's capacity only exceeded Europe's in 2017.]  As an example, in 2023 China installed between 180 and 230 gigawatts of solar, compared to 58 gigawatts in all European countries combined.

China's ownership of clean technology parts and patents makes a big difference to how quickly and cheaply they can install, as well as cheaper labour.

China's energy grid is also more efficient at handling energy from multiple sources, where as Europe's grid has been called "outdated". Hybridisation has been recommended as a solution.

Remember, this is capacity, not output.   Solar output is constrained, often curtailed by the grid operator, because of excess capacity in coal.  China is still building coal power stations, despite low capacity factors, and electricity utilities have quotas to use coal power in preference to solar and wind.  For China to significantly reduce emissions, it will have to rejig the electricity market.  When it does, emissions should plummet.

China's emissions fall because of declining oil use

 From Gavin Mooney

China’s emissions fell again in Q2, but for the first time it was falling oil use that drove them down.

That matters because until now China’s emissions story has tended to be a coal story.

According to Lauri Myllyvirta’s latest analysis for Carbon Brief, China’s CO₂ emissions fell 1% year-on-year in Q2 2026. When emissions have fallen previously, lower coal consumption was the main driver. This time, it was oil doing the work.

Oil use fell 9% overall and 16% in transport amid the Strait of Hormuz crisis.

But this is also not just a temporary shock. Transport activity was broadly stable or still growing, which means the fall in fuel use was enabled by structural changes already underway.

A few things are happening at once:

✅ EVs are now displacing enough oil to matter at national scale
✅ Existing EVs were used more, with charging volumes up 60% in Q2
✅ Rail, metro systems and electric trucks are reducing demand for petrol and diesel

The less rosy part is coal.

Coal use in the power sector still rose 2.4%, partly because more wind and solar output was curtailed due to grid and market constraints. Recent five-year plan documents include measures to improve clean-power utilisation, but this remains one of the key bottlenecks.

So this is not yet a clean “China’s emissions have peaked” moment.

It is more nuanced than that. China’s emissions have really been on a plateau since early 2024, with small moves up and down.

What is significant is that the pressure is now coming from more than one direction.

Until recently, the key question was whether clean electricity could reduce coal use fast enough to bring emissions down. Now oil demand is starting to pull in the same direction.

If coal and oil eventually start falling together, China’s emissions plateau could become a much clearer decline.

Read the Carbon Brief article here.

Ocean temperatures reach June record high

From The Guardian

Temperatures on the ocean surface have hit a record high, raising fears of another burst of extreme heat this summer.

On 21 June, temperatures outside the polar regions exceeded the extraordinary highs observed at the same time in 2023 and 2024, the Copernicus Climate Change Service said on Wednesday.

It warned the new peak would probably bring “consequences for weather patterns, global climate and marine ecosystems”, not least because it would coincide with the earliest phases of an El Niño event they forecast to be the strongest in decades.

When the previous ocean record for June was set in 2023, scientists described the trends as “worrying”, “terrifying” and “bonkers” because they were so far outside their expectations. That presaged an El Niño and a period of devastating global heatwaves, floods and storms.

That 2023 record has now been surpassed and much of the world is once again seeing an alarming rise in temperatures. Last month, the UK and many other countries in Europe sweltered amid new heat records while Antarctica experienced unprecedentedly balmy winter conditions.

Although the focus is usually on land temperatures, oceans give a fuller picture of how much the climate is being pushed out of balance by human-caused warming.

Surface temperatures are affected by solar radiation, water currents and the buildup of heat in the depths.

Oceans absorb more than 90% of the excess energy in the Earth system, which is primarily caused by burning fossil fuels, such as oil, coal and gas. That imbalance hit a record 23 zettajoules last year, more than double the average of the previous two decades.

As a result, the oceans are warming at an accelerating rate. In 2020, the amount of heat being added to the oceans was equivalent to about five Hiroshima bombs a second. Last year, it was closer to 11 Hiroshima explosions a second. The UN’s secretary general, António Guterres, has warned “Earth is being pushed beyond its limits”.

Scientists said it was too early to say whether the sea surface heating would prove temporary or even worsen because annual peaks are usually registered in July and August.

But Carlo Buontempo, Copernicus director at the European Centre for Medium-Range Weather Forecasts, warned it could indicate the beginning of a new phase, leading, once more, to uncharted territory: “With ocean temperatures at these levels and El Niño on the horizon, we are likely to see more temperature records fall in the coming months.”

Copernicus is part of the EU’s space programme.

We are not helpless.  

We can replace coal and gas power stations with wind, solar and batteries to at least 90% of total electricity generation.  We can replace petrol and diesel in land transport, in cars, light trucks, and buses, and we can switch diesel trains to bi-mode trains.  We can replace oil and gas heating with electric heating and/or heat pumps.  And 40% of all shipping emissions are produced just delivering fossil fuels around the world.   

Also, you can personally change things too.  Get balcony plug-in solar.  Get home plug-in batteries.  Nag your government until they make them legal.  Vote, vote, vote.  Stop eating meat, and if that's too hard, stop eating beef and mutton.  If you can afford it, when you replace your car, get an EV.  Outside the US, their up-front cost is now as low as petrol cars, and their running costs are much lower.

And you won't be spitting into the wind, because the world's biggest carbon-emitter, China, has probably peaked its emissions.  Even in Trump's US, though abolishing the incentives to switch to green alternatives has slowed bettrification down, EV sales have started to rise, and most of new generation capacity this year is renewables.  

Fossil fuel companies and the Right want us to give up.  Don't.

We've missed 1.5 degrees. Should we give up?

 No, of course not.  But maybe we should target growth in renewables infrastructure, setting targets for wind and solar and EVs and heat pumps.  These are direct targets, in order to achieve the indirect target of peaking and then reducing emissions, which will in turn lead to temperatures stopping rising.

From Just Have a Think.

China's green tech exports up 70%

From Jasmin Smajic 

China's exports for the solar, EV, and battery industries reached a record high of $21.9 billion in March 2026, up 70% year-on-year.

Trump's stupid attack on Iran has accelerated the shift to green tech.  And I suspect this is only the beginning.

UK EVs now cheaper than petrol cars

 From The Guardian

The price of new battery electric cars has fallen below petrol cars in the UK for the first time, according to the car sales website Autotrader, in a significant milestone in Britain’s transition away from fossil fuels.

The average price of a new electric car listed on the website was £42,620, compared with £43,405 for a new petrol model – making the former £785 cheaper based on advertised prices after discounts.

The higher upfront cost of electric vehicles has long been one of the big sticking points preventing some drivers from switching away from cars with polluting petrol and diesel engines towards those with battery motors, which do not emit carbon dioxide directly. Total running costs for electric cars have been lower for some time.

UK battery electric car sales accounted for 22% of new car sales in the first three months of the year, according to the Society of Motor Manufacturers and Traders, a lobby group.

Prices in the UK have been pushed down by the electric car grant brought in last summer, offering up to £3,750 off some models. Carmakers have also been under intense pressure to drop prices to meet electric car targets, known as the zero emission vehicle (ZEV) mandate, and from an influx of Chinese competitors that have been able to undercut traditional brands.

Autotrader is the UK’s biggest automotive marketplace, although it does not cover all transactions across the country. The data suggests that the UK has reached a pivotal moment for decarbonising its road transport, as a cheaper upfront cost and significantly lower running costs combine to make electric cars increasingly attractive to buyers.

Bex Kennett, the head of new car at Autotrader, said: " ...carmakers had been forced into historically high levels of discounting earlier this year” as they tried to increase electric sales. However, their efforts appear to have been aided by the war in Iran, which has caused a rise in petrol and diesel prices. Car sales platforms across Europe have reported large increases in inquiries for electric cars from consumers keen to cut their energy costs.

Gurjeet Grewal, the chief executive of Octopus Electric Vehicles, the car division of the energy company, said the term milestone “gets thrown around a lot, but this really is one. For the first time, EVs are cheaper than petrol cars on upfront cost – removing one of the biggest barriers to switching.

“They’ve long been cheaper to run, and now they’re cheaper to buy, too. Add in growing competition and more choice, and it’s clear the direction of travel: electric is the obvious option for drivers.”

However, the transition to electric cars in the UK still faces some barriers. Households across the country who do not have driveways are reliant on the public charging network, which remains patchy in some areas.

Given the strategic risks revealed by the Iranian war, the government should regard the EV subsidies as money well spent. 

In Australia, the BYD ATTO 1, shown below, is comparable in size and performance to the petrol Suzuki Swift, and is roughly the same price (AUD $24,000, which includes a 10% sales tax), without subsidies.  An A$3,000 subsidy for EVs costing less than $30,000 would sharply accelerate EV sales in Australia, as it is in the UK.

The BYD ATTO 1, Australia's cheapest EV.

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