Renewable energy

[4] Renewable energy sources, such as solar and wind power, have seen significant cost reductions over the past decade, making them more competitive with traditional fossil fuels.

[10][11] The main motivation to replace fossil fuels with renewable energy sources is to slow and eventually stop climate change, which is widely agreed to be caused mostly by greenhouse gas emissions.

[43] Green hydrogen is a more economical means of long-term renewable energy storage, in terms of capital expenditures compared to pumped hydroelectric or batteries.

Examples include solar chimneys,[12] orienting a building to the sun, using construction materials that can store heat, and designing spaces that naturally circulate air.

Despite reductions in Japan and India due to policy changes and COVID-19, growth in China, the United States, and a significant increase from Vietnam's feed-in tariff program offset these declines.

[12] PV systems range from small, residential and commercial rooftop or building integrated installations, to large utility-scale photovoltaic power station.

[120] There is also a great deal of research involving algal fuel, which is attractive because algae is a non-food resource, grows around 20 times faster than most food crops, and can be grown almost anywhere.

For example, enhanced geothermal systems involve drilling around 10 kilometres (6.2 mi) into the Earth, breaking apart hot rocks and extracting the heat using water.

[144] Collection of static electricity charges from water droplets on metal surfaces is an experimental technology that would be especially useful in low-income countries with relative air humidity over 60%.

[147][148] In addition to seawater the average crustal granite rocks contain significant quantities of uranium and thorium with which breeder reactors can supply abundant energy for the remaining lifespan of the sun on the main sequence of stellar evolution.

[149] Artificial photosynthesis uses techniques including nanotechnology to store solar electromagnetic energy in chemical bonds by splitting water to produce hydrogen and then using carbon dioxide to make methanol.

[150] Researchers in this field strived to design molecular mimics of photosynthesis that use a wider region of the solar spectrum, employ catalytic systems made from abundant, inexpensive materials that are robust, readily repaired, non-toxic, stable in a variety of environmental conditions and perform more efficiently allowing a greater proportion of photon energy to end up in the storage compounds, i.e., carbohydrates (rather than building and sustaining living cells).

[151] However, prominent research faces hurdles, Sun Catalytix a MIT spin-off stopped scaling up their prototype fuel-cell in 2012 because it offers few savings over other ways to make hydrogen from sunlight.

[17] In June 2022 IEA Executive Director Fatih Birol said that countries should invest more in renewables to "ease the pressure on consumers from high fossil fuel prices, make our energy systems more secure, and get the world on track to reach our climate goals.

In 2018, the risk management firm, DNV GL, forecasts that the world's primary energy mix will be split equally between fossil and non-fossil sources by 2050.

These principles included choice (between suppliers and between products), cost competitiveness, longer term fixed price supplies, access to third-party financing vehicles, and collaboration.

Global and national policies related to renewable energy can be divided based on sectors, such as agriculture, transport, buildings, industry: Climate neutrality (net zero emissions) by the year 2050 is the main goal of the European Green Deal.

[218] For the European Union to reach their target of climate neutrality, one goal is to decarbonise its energy system by aiming to achieve "net-zero greenhouse gas emissions by 2050.

[62] In 2023, the renewable energy sector experienced a significant surge in investments, particularly in solar and wind technologies, totaling approximately USD 200 billion—a 75% increase from the previous year.

[229] Many fossil-fuel producing countries, such as Qatar, Russia, Saudi Arabia and Norway, are currently able to exert diplomatic or geopolitical influence as a result of their oil wealth.

[232][233] In particular, China has become the world's dominant manufacturer of the technology needed to produce or store renewable energy, especially solar panels, wind turbines, and lithium-ion batteries.

Analysts consider Nigeria, Angola, Chad, Gabon, and Sudan, all countries with a history of military coups, to be at risk of instability due to dwindling oil income.

[240] In October 2021, European Commissioner for Climate Action Frans Timmermans suggested "the best answer" to the 2021 global energy crisis is "to reduce our reliance on fossil fuels.

"[241] Some critics blamed the European Union Emissions Trading System (EU ETS) and closure of nuclear plants for contributing to the energy crisis.

[248] For each of the most relevant minerals and metals, its mining is dominated by a single country: copper in Chile, nickel in Indonesia, rare earths in China, cobalt in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), and lithium in Australia.

[249] This would damage local biodiversity,[250] but proponents point out that biomass on resource-rich seabeds is much scarcer than in the mining regions on land, which are often found in vulnerable habitats like rainforests.

They are often much larger than fossil fuel power plants, needing areas of land up to 10 times greater than coal or gas to produce equivalent energy amounts.

[256][257][258] Solar panels are recycled to reduce electronic waste and create a source for materials that would otherwise need to be mined,[259] but such business is still small and work is ongoing to improve and scale-up the process.

[260][261][262] Solar power plants may compete with arable land,[266][267] while on-shore wind farms often face opposition due to aesthetic concerns and noise.

[283]Max Weber mentioned the end of fossil fuel in the concluding paragraphs of his Die protestantische Ethik und der Geist des Kapitalismus (The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism), published in 1905.