The International Energy Agency (IEA) has released a report in March 2019, titled, “Global Energy & CO2 Status Report 2018.” This annual report provides a snapshot of recent global trends and developments across fuels (coal, oil, gas), electricity, renewable sources, energy efficiency and carbon emissions in 2018. This article highlights the global trends outlined in the report.
The demand for all fuels has increased but the biggest gains came from natural gas, as the fuel of choice in 2018, accounting for almost 45% of the increase in total energy demand. Fossil fuels met nearly 70% of the growth. Oil and coal accounted for 25% of the global demand growth. Solar and wind energy have shown a double-digit growth.
A major factor that caused almost a 20% increase in the global energy demand is the weather conditions in 2018 that pushed up the demand for cooling and heating, since the average summer and winter temperatures respectively, across certain regions, reached historical highs and lows.Thus, the growth in energy needs has occurred primarily due to a higher electricity demand.
The global electricity demand grew by 4% in 2018, thereby coming closer to a 20% share in the total consumption of energy. The increase in power generation contributed to more than half of the growth in primary energy demand. Due to an increase in energy consumption, carbon emissions showed a record increase of 1.7% in 2018. Coal-fired power generation has been the single largest contributor, accounting for 30% of all energy-related carbon emissions.
Renewables, which grew by over 4%, accounted for 25% of the growth in primary energy demand. In terms of expansion in electricity generation, renewables contributed 45% of the growth in 2018. The growth in nuclear by 3.3% was a result of the new capacity addition in China and the restarting of four reactors in Japan. Globally, 7% of the increase in energy demand was met by nuclear generation.
The United States, China and India collectively accounted for approximately 70% of the rise in energy demand. After three years of decline, the energy demand in the US grew by 3.7%. It was also responsible for the largest rise in gas and oil demand worldwide. Half of this rise was caused due to the weather changes. Gas consumption rose by 10% since 2017, which has been the fastest increase recorded by IEA since 1971. This increase is equivalent to the UK’s current gas consumption.
One-third of the increase in the global energy demand took place in China, at a growth rate of 3.5%, the highest since 2012. This country also witnessed the world’s largest increase in wind and solar generation in 2018. The inputs to the power sector contributed to over 95% of the Chinese growth in energy demand. There was an expansion in the power generation from all technologies, especially coal, to meet the 8.5% jump in electricity demand.
With the third-largest share, the primary energy demand in India rose by 4%, thereby accounting for 11% of the global growth. Coal for power generation and oil for transport purposes were the first and second largest contributors respectively, to the growth in energy demand in India.
The 2018 trend of energy demand in Europe followed a different route. The economic expansion of 1.8% led to an increase in energy demand by only 0.2%. In Germany, the increase in energy efficiency led to a 2.2% dip in energy demand and oil demand fell by more than 6%. The energy demand in the UK and France increased only moderately.
Thus, in a nutshell, 2018 witnessed an increase in the global energy consumption by 2.3%, at nearly twice the average rate of growth, since 2010. This growth has been driven by a robust global economy (expansion by 3.7% in 2018) and increase in the heating and cooling needs across certain regions.However, there has been a lack of improvement in terms of energy efficiency.
All information and images sourced from IEA’s online report.
India Outbound
March 29, 2019
source https://indiaoutbound.org/ieas-global-energy-co2-status-report-2018-global-trends/
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