Growth in renewables helped reduce global emissions in 2022

The growth of solar and wind power, electric vehicles (EVs), heat pumps, and energy efficiency measures helped to reduce the rise in global energy-related emissions in 2022 to less than 1 per cent.

The energy crisis fuelled fears of runaway growth in carbon emissions, but new analysis from the International Energy Agency (IEA) shows that the increased use of clean energy technologies helped avoid an additional 550 million tonnes of emissions and offset most of the increase in emissions from gas and oil.

Read the IEA report: CO2 Emissions in 2022

Although the rise last year was far smaller than the exceptional jump of over 6 per cent in 2021, emissions remain on an unsustainable growth trajectory, says the IEA, calling for stronger actions to accelerate the clean energy transition.

“The impacts of the energy crisis didn’t result in the major increase in global emissions that was initially feared – and this is thanks to the outstanding growth of renewables, EVs, heat pumps and energy efficient technologies,” said IEA Executive Director Fatih Birol.

“Without clean energy, the growth in CO2 emissions would have been nearly three times as high. However, we still see emissions growing from fossil fuels, hindering efforts to meet the world’s climate targets.

“International and national fossil fuel companies are making record revenues and need to take their share of responsibility, in line with their public pledges to meet climate goals. It’s critical that they review their strategies to make sure they’re aligned with meaningful emissions reductions.”