Aside from increasing demand for cooling to cope with last year’s record temperatures, rising consumption from industry, the electrification of transport, and the growth of energy-hungry data centers and artificial intelligence also boosted electricity use globally in 2024.

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Rising global demand for energy in 2024 was largely met by renewables and natural gas, according to a new report by the International Energy Agency (IEA).

Global energy demand expanded by 2.2% during the year, surpassing the average annual demand increase of 1.3% observed between 2013 and 2023, according to the IEA’s latest Global Energy Review report published Monday. Emerging and developing economies accounted for over 80% of this upsurge, despite a slowdown in energy consumption growth in China, the world’s largest producer and consumer of electricity ahead of the US, the report also found.

The power sector emerged as a key driver of this growth, with a substantial 4.3% increase in global electricity consumption, nearly double the annual average over the past decade. Record global temperatures last year, the hottest year on record, drove the surge in electricity usage as it escalated demand for cooling. But the report also attributed it to other factors, including increased industrial consumption, the electrification of transport, and the expanding presence of data centers and artificial intelligence.

Renewable energy sources played a pivotal role in meeting the rising electricity demand, with around 700 gigawatts of new renewable power capacity added globally in 2024, marking a new annual record for the 22nd consecutive year. Additionally, nuclear power capacity saw its fifth-highest increase in the past three decades, with 33% more nuclear power capacity brought online compared to 2023.

Together, renewables and nuclear sources accounted for 80% of the additional global electricity generation and contributed 40% of the total generation for the first time.

Natural gas supplies also increased steadily, with demand rising by 2.7%, much faster than the average over the past decade. The fossil fuel accounted for 28% of the growth in global energy supply, behind renewables (28%), and ahead of coal (15%), oil (11%), and nuclear (8%).

Last October, the IEA said that the world is set to add an unprecedented amount of renewable capacity between now and 2030, outperforming governments’ own national targets.

Over 5,500 gigawatts of new renewable capacity will be added globally in the next five years, the equivalent of the current total power capacity of China, the European Union, India, and the US combined. According to energy think tank Ember, renewable energy currently accounts for little over 30% of global electricity.

At COP28 in 2023, the world committed to tripling global renewable energy capacity by the decade’s end. While the unprecedented expansion of renewable electricity was “giving [the world] a real chance of achieving” the target, October’s data still suggests the world will still fall short of meeting it, the IEA said.

Carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions continued to rise in 2024, albeit slower thanks to the rapid adoption of clean energy technologies, the IEA said. Solar PV, wind, nuclear, electric cars, and heat pumps deployment between 2019 and now prevents some 2.6 billion tonnes of CO2 – approximately 7% of global emissions – from entering the atmosphere every year.

“[T]he strong expansion of solar, wind, nuclear power and EVs is increasingly loosening the links between economic growth and emissions,” said IEA Executive Director Fatih Birol.

CO2, a by-product of burning fossil fuels, biomass, land-use changes, and industrial processes such as cement production, is the principal anthropogenic greenhouse gas in the atmosphere, responsible for about three-quarters of planet-warming emissions. 

Global CO2 emissions from fossil fuels have increased by more than 60% since 1990, and atmospheric CO2 concentrations are now 50% higher than it was before the onset of the Industrial Revolution.

The IEA has urged countries to halt new gas and oil field projects, arguing that this is the only way to keep the 1.5C-compatible net-zero emissions scenario alive.

Featured image: Joan Sullivan / Climate Visuals Countdown.

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co2 emissions electricity consumption international energy agency (IEA) natural gas nuclear energy Renewable Energy