Friday , March 29 2024
[fb_plugin like]

Late offshore wind finance surge pushes 2019 renewables investment past 2018

[ad_1]

Investment in renewable energy capacity worldwide was $282.2 billion last year, up one per cent from 2018’s US$280.2 billion, with China, the world’s biggest market, slipping back, but its second-largest, the United States, hitting a new record.

The latest data from research company BloombergNEF (BNEF), just published, shows how what had been a subdued first few months of 2019 gave way to a busier second half, with the highlights including US onshore wind and, in particular, offshore wind in China and Europe.

The late surge in offshore wind financings took capacity investment in that sector to US$29.9 billion, up 19 per cent on 2018 and US$2 billion more than in the previous record year of 2016.

Among the offshore projects reaching financial close in the fourth quarter were the 432-megawatt (MW) Neart na Gaoithe array off the Scottish coast at US$3.4 billion, the 376MW Formosa II Miaoli project off Taiwan at US$2 billion and the 500MW Fuzhou Changle C installation in the East China Sea, at US$1.5 billion.

The first of France’s offshore wind projects to be financed, the 480MW, US$2.5 billion Saint Nazaire, got its go-ahead in the third quarter.

Tom Harries, head of wind research at BNEF, commented: “Offshore wind developers in China brought forward 15 projects to beat a scheduled expiry of that country’s feed-in tariff.

“We expect the sector’s global momentum to continue in 2020, with the focus on gigawatt-scale projects in the British North Sea and the first commercial arrays off the US East Coast.”

Looking at the overall renewable energy capacity investment figures for 2019, wind (onshore and offshore) led the way with US$138.2 billion globally, up six per cent.

Solar was close behind, at US$131.1 billion, down three per cent.

Falling capital costs in wind and solar meant that the two combined are likely to have seen around 180 gigawatts (GW) added last year, up some 20GW on 2018.

Among the smaller sectors, biomass and waste-to-energy saw US$9.7 billion of capacity investment in 2019, up nine per cent.

Geothermal languished on US$1 billion, down 56 per cent, while biofuels were down 43 per cent at an estimated US$500 million, and small hydro three per cent lower at US$1.7 billion.

China was yet again the biggest investor in renewable energy, at US$83.4 billion in 2019, but this was eight per cent down on 2018 and the lowest since 2013.

It saw a 10 per cent rise in wind investment to US$55 billion, but solar fell 33 per cent to US$25.7 billion, less than a third of the boom figure reached in 2017.

Despite the best effort of President Donald Trump to bolster the fossil fuel industry the US was the second-largest investing country in renewable energy capacity, at US$55.5 billion, up 28 per cent on 2018.

Instrumental in this was a rush by wind and solar developers to qualify for federal tax credits that were due for scale-back in 2020.

“It’s notable that in this third year of the Trump presidency, which has not been particularly supportive of renewable energy, US clean energy investment set a new record by a country mile,” said Ethan Zindler, head of Americas for BNEF.

He noted that the second-highest year for investment (US$45.7 billion) came in President Trump’s first year, 2017.

“These technologies are more cost-competitive than ever, and the fact that there was a tax credit step-down on the horizon made the market particularly busy in 2019.”

Europe slipped behind the US in 2019, investing US$54.3 billion in renewables capacity, down seven per cent.

Spain led the way with US$8.4 billion, up 25 per cent on 2018 and the highest annual figure for that country since 2011.

Pietro Radoia, senior associate for solar at BNEF, said: “The US$6 billion of solar investment in Spain in 2019 is impressive because these projects are going ahead at record-low costs per megawatt.

“Developers are building PV parks on the back of low tariffs agreed in government-run auctions or, increasingly, without any subsidy support at all.”

The United Kingdom invested US$5.3 billion, down 40 per cent and its lowest since 2007.

Germany was down 30 per cent at US$4.4 billion, its lowest since 2004, and Sweden was down 19 per cent at US$3.7 billion, but the Netherlands was up 25 per cent at US$5.5 billion, France three per cent higher at US$4.4 billion, and Ukraine 56 per cent up at US$3.4 billion.

Japan invested $16.5 billion in renewable capacity, mainly solar, in 2019, down 10 per cent, while Australia committed US$5.6 billion, down 40 per cent.

India put US$9.3 billion into green energy, 14 per cent less than in 2018, while the United Arab Emirates invested a record US$4.5 billion, almost all of it for the 950MW Al Maktoum IV solar thermal and photovoltaic complex in Dubai.

BNEF’s wider-definition of total clean energy investment, which includes money going into research and development, and into specialist companies via public market share issues and venture capital and private equity deals, was US$363.3 billion in 2019, fractionally up on the previous year’s revised US$362.5 billion.

Within this total, public markets invested US$9.3 billion in clean energy, 13 per cent less than in 2018, while VC/PE investors put in US$10.5 billion, up six per cent and their highest figure since 2010.

US electric car companies accounted for the biggest deals in both categories: Tesla with an US$862.5 million public market secondary issue, and Rivian Automotive with a US$1.3 billion private equity round.

Corporate and government research and development in wider-definition clean energy totalled US$45.7 billion in 2019, up one per cent.

More on BNEF’s 2019 clean energy investment figures can be found at https://about.bnef.com/clean-energy-investment/.

BNEF also published its 10 Predictions for 2020 in energy, transport and sustainability today. Click here to view them.

EcoNews is an independent publication that relies on contributions from its readers.

WE’RE BUILDING A PLATFORM WITH A CLEAR FOCUS ON THE ENVIRONMENT, CULTURAL AND SOCIAL GOOD. CONTRIBUTE AND TOGETHER WE CAN MAKE AN IMPACT.

Click Here to Contribute

[ad_2]
Source link

Y Not Freakin’ Recyclable Home

About Zohe

Environmentalist, Futurist, Lightworker, Wannabe naturalist. The way we are treating our world and environment is not going to end well! We need to change course NOW.

Check Also

Global Warming Pictures|| Save🌏 plz👈😔#shorts #viral

Global Warming Pictures|| #savewater #pollution #globalisation #saveearth #planttree source