Global New Energy Buy-In Boomed In 2020

Energy Transition’s Half-Trillion-Dollar Year Is Even Better Than It Looks

Nathaniel Bullard, January 21, 2021 (BloombergNEF)

Global investment in wind and solar power, biofuels, biomass and waste, small hydropower—the main technologies behind clean electricity—has expanded by nearly an order of magnitude…[C]lean-energy investment surged from $33 billion nearly two decades ago to more than $300 billion last year. Growth in investment stopped in the mid-2010s…

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But electricity is just one slice of the energy-transition pie. A new BNEF analysis including the electrification of heat and transport as well as nascent investment in energy storage, hydrogen, and carbon capture and storage shows that overall investment grew to $501 billion—nearly 70% higher than older, narrower estimates…[From 2005 to 2019, there was an over 20% compound annual growth rate] of wind and solar…[and] will double again in less than four years if it keeps up this pace…[B]ig markets invested less in renewable energy last year, while small markets invested way more. China’s new investment in renewable energy declined 12% in 2020, and U.S. investment dropped 20%. Meanwhile, U.K. investment was up 177%; Netherlands, 221%; and Vietnam, 89%...

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…[There was also] a surge in investment in electrified transport…[that drove] down manufacturing costs for the entire sector…Finally, there’s been a jump in share price of publicly traded renewables companies…and many were greater than] the S&P 500 and Nasdaq…Renewable energy and energy storage companies also issued $20 billion of new shares last year, a record that was up almost 250% from 2019…[though] less than the $28 billion electric vehicle companies raised on public exchanges last year, up from just $1.6 billion in 2019, and seven times the previous record set in 2016…” click here for more

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