As prices fall, renewable energy becomes more popular

The Guardian reports on the surge in new renewable energy capacity across the globe and cites falling prices as the main driver.

The report observes...

The greater “bang-for-buck” resulted from plummeting prices for solar and wind power and led to new power deals in countries including Denmark, Egypt, India, Mexico and the United Arab Emirates all being priced well below fossil fuel or nuclear options.

This suggests that the shift to solar and wind - especially solar, as PV provided the greatest share of new electricity capacity -  has now reached the point of no return. This is the free market at work and politicians and their cack-handed interventions are becoming irrelevant. Donald Trump’s decision to remove the US from the Paris Accord may have produced much wailing and gnashing of teeth from the political class but the fact is, now solar has become the cheapest and quickest way to create new electricity supply, government policies no longer matter.

We’ve been suggesting for years that the energy market was something too important to be left in the hands of the politicians; the market is providing the means for both the developed and developing world to create cheap and carbon free electricity.

You can read the Guardian report here.