The one that is taking shape in the world surpassed a symbolic milestone in 2025: for the first time in more than 100 years, the generation of electricity with renewables – solar, wind and hydroelectric, mainly – surpassed on the planet that produced with coal, the fossil fuel that contributes the most to global warming. It is one of the points highlighted by the seventh edition of the annual report Global Electricity Review, by the British analyst group Ember, which is based on data from 91 countries in which 93% of global electricity demand is concentrated. “The world is entering an era of clean growth and leaving another of growth based on fossil fuels in the electricity sector,” summarizes the .
Last year, renewables accounted for 33.8% of global electricity production thanks largely to the “rapid and continuous growth of solar generation” and also, although to a lesser extent, to wind power. Meanwhile, electricity produced with coal decreased by 0.6% and held a 33% share. For the first time in history, coal covered less than a third of generation, the same analysis highlights. You have to go back to 1919 to find a time when renewables generated more electricity than these fuels. For a brief period, after the end of World War I and coinciding with the commissioning of large dams around the world, hydroelectric power overtook coal.
As Nicolas Fulghum, one of the authors of this study, explains to EL PAÍS, the overtaking It doesn’t seem like something anecdotal or temporary. “The rapid growth of solar and wind energy makes this milestone most likely permanent.” It is the result of a sustained trend, adds Fulghum: “The share of coal has fallen steadily over the last decade, from 39% in 2015 to 33% in 2025. In contrast, renewables increased from 23% to 34% in the same period and are expected to continue growing rapidly in the coming years.”
For this reason, Ember’s report points to a “structural change” that implies an “abundance of clean electricity”, which in turn “is allowing the electrification of other sectors, such as transportation, which reduces the growth of fossil fuels throughout the economy.” Because Ember focuses on the electrical sector. To complete the picture, we must extend it to other key energy areas such as transportation and air conditioning, where the fossil dominance is also beginning to falter thanks to the cost reduction of cleaner technological alternatives.
In , the International Energy Agency (IEA) points, in addition to the strong push for solar energy, to the stagnation of the growth of oil demand on the planet. According to this agency, in 2025 it grew by 0.7%. And to understand what is happening, the IEA points to mobility: “Sales of electric cars continued their rapid growth, increasing more than 20% to exceed 20 million units, around a quarter of new car sales in 2025.”
Added to this are the war conflicts that increasingly place the focus on energy security. Ember highlights the “two major crises linked to fossil fuels” that the world has experienced in just four years: “The invasion of Ukraine by Russia and, more recently, the conflict between the United States, Israel and Iran.” What they have done is highlight “the fragility of a global energy system exposed to the volatility of fossil fuel markets.”
Fulghum recalls that “countries that have scaled renewable energy faster in recent years are more resistant to fossil fuel price shocks.” “Wholesale energy prices in Spain were significantly less affected by the increase in gas prices than in Italy, where the deployment of renewables has been slower than in Spain,” says this Ember analyst. “The path to energy independence for fossil fuel importers lies in the development of energy sources such as solar and wind that can produce energy at the national level,” he emphasizes.
Although only four years have passed between these two fossil crises linked to the wars in Europe and the Middle East, precisely in those years there has been a photovoltaic revolution. “In 2022, the share of global solar generation was 4.6%. Since then, it has almost doubled, reaching 8.7% in 2025,” says Fulghum. Because as security problems linked to oil or gas became more evident, “the costs of solar, wind and battery storage have fallen even further, making them cheaper than alternatives to fossil fuels almost everywhere.”
The advance of solar energy is the great energy and climate headline of recent years. Last year, 75% of the entire increase in global electricity demand was covered with this technology. In fact, according to Ember, 2025 was the first year since 2020 in which there was no increase in electricity generation from fossil sources despite the increase in demand. “The growth of solar generation was 18 times greater than that of gas, the only fossil fuel that had an increase in 2025,” adds the study, which highlights that this technology registered an increase of 30% year-on-year last year.
Along the same lines, the report from the International Energy Agency points to the rise of solar energy in the world. “For the first time in history, a renewable technology, solar photovoltaics, contributed the most to meeting the increase in energy demand in the world,” stressed the IEA, which in its report analyzes the entire energy sector, not just the electrical sector like Ember.
solar energy at night
The next leap that is emerging is that of storage, as Ember highlights. “The rapid expansion of solar generation is occurring more frequently alongside the deployment of battery storage, enabling a paradigm shift: from daytime solar to around-the-clock solar.” What these systems do is accumulate the electricity that is generated when the sun shines and release it into the grid at night when it is needed.
As with solar technology, “battery costs fell dramatically for the second year in a row” last year. “In 2024, these fell by 20%. In 2025, they fell by a further 45%,” notes the Ember study. “As a result, by 2025, the world added enough battery storage capacity to shift 14% of new solar generation to other times beyond the middle of the day,” that is, when there is no longer any sun.
But, despite progress, the transition has not yet reached the necessary speed. Proof of this are the energy-related carbon dioxide emissions. According to IEA data, in 2024 they increased by around 0.4%. China especially contributed to this virtual stagnation, where emissions of this greenhouse gas fell hand in hand with the rise of renewable energy. Similarly, in India they remained stable for the first time since the 1970s. Although there are climatic reasons related to the monsoon, the IEA also points to a structural growth of renewable energies in what is already the most populous country in the world. In any case, it is not enough for emissions to stagnate, as seems to have happened in the world. They must fall strongly if the most catastrophic warming is to be avoided, as science warns.
