The International Energy Agency (IEA) published a report on Tuesday, calling on countries to draw up clear plans for the promotion of renewable energies.
The report, called "COP28 Tripling Renewable Capacity Pledge: Tracking countries' ambitions and identifying policies to bridge the gap", recognizes China's contribution to the global development of renewable energies. The report said that while renewable power is at the heart of achieving international energy and climate goals, very few countries have explicitly laid out 2030 targets under the Paris Agreement for installed capacity in their existing Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs). Official commitments in NDCs currently amount to 1,300 gigawatts (GW) - just 12 percent of what is required to meet the global objective set in Dubai of tripling renewable energy capacity by 2030.
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IEA's report, which covers nearly 150 countries worldwide, finds that governments' domestic ambitions go much further, corresponding to almost 8,000 GW of global installed renewable capacity by 2030. This means that if countries were to include all their existing policies, plans and estimates in their new NDCs due next year - which will include revised ambitions for 2030 and new goals for 2035 - they would reflect 70 percent of what is needed by 2030 to reach the tripling goal. This corresponds to 11,000 GW of installed renewable capacity globally.
Therefore, there is ample scope for countries to bring their NDCs in line with their current domestic ambitions - although the report emphasizes that implementation also needs to be accelerated.
China's goal of 1,200 GW of solar PV and wind capacity this decade accounts for over 90 percent of all renewable capacity mentioned in NDCs. The scale and speed of the expansion of China's renewable capacity will be crucial for the overall pace of global deployment through 2030, IEA said.
"At COP28, nearly 200 countries pledged to triple the world's renewable power capacity this decade, which is one of the critical actions to keep alive hopes of limiting global warming to 1.5 Celsius degrees. This report makes clear that the tripling target is ambitious but achievable - though only if governments quickly turn promises into plans of action," said IEA Executive Director Fatih Birol.
"By delivering on the goals agreed at COP28 - including tripling renewables and doubling energy efficiency improvements by 2030 - countries worldwide have a major opportunity to accelerate progress towards a more secure, affordable and sustainable energy system, " he said.