Investment in climate-friendly energy is extending its lead over fossil fuels, yet spending trends in both buckets are out of step with Paris Agreement goals, a new report finds.
Driving the news: The International Energy Agency just dropped its latest annual look at investments in "clean" and fossil energy.
- "Clean" includes wind, solar, batteries, EVs, nuclear, efficiency, grid tech and carbon capture.
🧮 One wild stat: IEA sees 2023 solar investment, at $380 billion, outpacing oil exploration and production spending for the first time.
- The comparison is limited — transportation and other markets are far bigger sources of oil demand than power.
- But it encapsulates wider trends afoot. Also, the lines between transport fuels and power are blurring as EVs rise.
The big picture: Russia's invasion of Ukraine has boosted clean energy, even as it prompted a near-term "scramble" for oil and gas, IEA finds.
- The oil and gas sector is boosting investment in exploration and production — but not compared with high profits.
- Forces including investor pressure for returns, and questions about long-term demand, mean that "only large Middle Eastern national oil companies are spending much more in 2023 than they did in 2022."
Threat level: The overall picture is mixed.
- "Clean" investment is growing, but the world is behind the eight ball on the emissions cuts needed for Paris goals.
- If you look at IEA's hypothetical pathway to net-zero emissions by 2050, investment in only a "handful" of technologies — including solar and battery storage — is on track.
- Meanwhile, "coal investment this year is on course to reach nearly six times the levels envisaged in 2030 in the Net Zero Scenario," IEA notes.