[Episode #274] – Global Electricity Review 2026

The Ember Global Electricity Review 2026 reveals a watershed moment for the power sector. In 2025, global electricity generated from fossil fuels actually declined—a first since the pandemic‑induced dip of 2020—and the drop was not an anomaly but the direct result of renewables outpacing demand growth. Solar power posted the largest single‑year increase of any electricity source, while wind and solar together supplied 99% of the additional 849 TWh of demand. For the first time in modern history, renewable generation (34% of total) overtook coal (33%), pushing coal below a third of global supply for the first time in a century.

China and India, together responsible for 42% of worldwide fossil generation, both recorded reductions in coal‑based electricity, shaving roughly 79 million tonnes of CO₂—equivalent to Brazil’s power‑sector emissions. This clean‑energy surge absorbed the entire net demand increase and even created a modest surplus of 38 TWh, offsetting modest fossil upticks in the US and EU. The report underscores the power sector’s dual role: it must decarbonize itself while providing the electricity needed to electrify transport, industry, and heating. EV adoption, electric arc furnaces, and emerging electric aviation are already translating clean‑grid growth into emissions cuts across other sectors.

Among the headline projects, China commissioned the world’s largest offshore solar farm—a 1 GW, 1.8 TWh‑per‑year installation off Shandong’s coast—featuring 2.3 million bifacial panels and a 100 MW/200 MWh storage system that boosts effective capacity by about 20% and cuts costs by roughly 15%. Such innovations, coupled with laboratory breakthroughs promising higher cell efficiencies, signal that the momentum behind solar and wind is unlikely to stall. As clean generation continues to meet—and eventually exceed—new demand, the power sector is poised to become the backbone of a broader, economy‑wide decarbonization pathway.