Down to the Crossroads

Monday 26 January 2026

Global power generation from wind and solar has reached a level that’s equal to total generation from all sources in the United States. And this is 2024 data — 2025 data will arrive in late spring—so global wind and solar have almost certainly risen above this level. Recorded at 4,623 TWh of generation in 2024, global wind and solar likely added another 800 TWh in 2025 and now roughly generate about 5,400 TWh annually. That is very strong growth.

Indeed, the growth of wind and solar globally has been so strong that they equalled the total generation from all sources in the EU as recently as 2021, right around the 2,900 TWh level. Only three years were required to grow global wind and solar generation another 1,700 TWh to the 2024 level of 4,623 TWh. While the effort to kick off actual declines in global generation from fossil fuels remains a difficult problem to solve, there is clearly no problem at all with either the rate or the volume of wind and solar growth globally.

The most important metric for power sector decarbonization is of course total global demand growth for power, and 2025 has turned out to be notably weaker than expected. When we measure how much of this new demand globally is matched by the growth of wind and solar generation, weaker growth in total demand naturally lowers the success threshold for wind and solar, in their ongoing effort to entirely kill the growth of fossil fuel generation. Most estimates of last year’s total demand growth from all sources point to a 3.3% annual increase—far below the 4.3% increase in 2024 and also below the IEA’s previous headline forecast for three straight years of 4.0% (or even higher) growth.

Setting aside the percentages for a moment, it’s not hard or complicated to understand the basic proposition here: If total wind and solar generation added a fresh 800 TWh, we need total global power demand growth to either match that volume or, better still, fall below it. Alas, even with last year’s slower growth in total demand, wind and solar once again did not (quite) cover that gain. This also means that unless hydropower or nuclear power came to the rescue last year (again, we are still working with estimates until official 2025 data is released), then global power sector emissions either increased or stayed flat.

So how has 2025 shaped up so far, as we put it all together? Wind and solar growth are a tad stronger, and total demand is a tad weaker, but combined wind and solar have once again missed out on covering all the growth. Based on current estimates, 2025 likely saw 1,031 TWh of total demand growth, against wind and solar’s 800 TWh. Furthermore, using an updated IEA estimate of 3.7% for 2026 total power demand growth, the projection suggests once again that wind and solar growth don’t quite make it across the line.

Cold Eye Earth would like to remind readers of two concepts that are truly helpful in understanding the interplay between the growth of clean generation, and legacy, incumbent generation:

1. A small thing growing fast is a powerful phenomenon that will shock you with its ability to overtake a large thing.

2. A large thing growing slowly can be devilishly hard to constrain, and will resist its overthrow durably for a long period of time.

We see the same phenomenon across a number of domains, including the intellectual realm, where new and popular ideas can grow and spread quickly, even as older, incumbent ideas that “should have died already!” press onward.