Clean energy crossed the tipping point

Clean energy crossed the tipping point

Clean energy crossed the tipping point For the first time in energy history, clean power didn't just grow alongside fossil fuels. It started replacing them — and the data makes the structural shift undeniable. Ember's 2025 global electricity data reveals a decisive inflection point: solar and wind output grew faster than total electricity demand, meaning renewables didn't just absorb growth — they displaced existing fossil fuel generation for the first time on record. Solar alone added ~550 TWh of new generation, more than double the UK's entire annual consumption (~280 TWh). Fossil fuel output declined by an estimated 1-2% in absolute terms, small but historically significant. The Achilles heel is time-of-day economics. Using a simple Duck Curve framework, the gap between renewable generation peaks (midday) and demand peaks (6–9pm) still runs 40-80 GW in the US WECC grid alone on high-solar days. Battery storage is the required bridge — yet utility-scale storage currently covers less than 4 hours of average peak demand in most major economies, against the 6-8 hours analysts model as the threshold for reliable fossil displacement. That duration gap is where the capital question lives. Project finance for long-duration storage (8–100 hours) remains structurally underfunded relative to lithium-ion 4-hour systems, which attract the majority of IRA and REPowerEU incentives. Flow batteries, compressed air, and iron-air technologies are technically proven but lack the standardized offtake structures that institutional capital requires at scale. 🔗 Source: https://www.ft.com/content/d525d8ea-9a07-4e22-8780-48bae3fdf2bb