Power from renewable energy sources is getting cheaper every year, according to a study released Wednesday, challenging long-standing myths that clean energy technology is too expensive to adopt.

According to the study by the Abu Dhabi-based International Renewable Energy Agency, the costs associated with extracting power from solar panels has fallen as much as 60 percent in just the past few years.

The price of generating power from other renewables, including wind, hydro power, concentrating solar power and biomass, was also falling.

“One of the (myths) out there perpetuated by industry lobby groups is that renewable energy is too expensive,” said Adnan Amin, IRENA’s director general.

The numbers tell a different story however as “costs are falling exponentially… and will continue (to do so) in the future,” said Amin arguing that electricity generation “is now cost competitive with many traditional fossil fuel technologies.”

According to Dolf Gielen, director of IRENA’s innovation and technology centre, investment in renewables is no longer a niche but rather represents the “bulk of investments in global power generation,” accounting for half of the total annual capacity additions worldwide.

“The markets are growing very fast… and further cost reductions are very likely,” he said adding that in 2011, investments in the supply side of renewable energy sources reached about $260 billion.

A second IRENA study released Wednesday estimates renewables will create a minimum of 4 million jobs just in the electricity sector in rural areas of the developing world.

Today, there are five million jobs world-wide in the renewable energy sector and more than 1.3 billion people, mainly in Africa and Asia, who do not have access to electricity, according to IRENA.

“There is considerable employment potential,” said Amin.

Founded in 2009, IRENA is an intergovernmental organisation established to promote the widespread use of renewable energy sources. It has more than 155 member states and is headquartered in Abu Dhabi.

5 Comments on "Renewable energy costs falling"

Kenz300 on Fri, 8th Jun 2012 10:07 pm 



Quote — ” the costs associated with extracting power from solar panels has fallen as much as 60 percent in just the past few years.
The price of generating power from other renewables, including wind, hydro power, concentrating solar power and biomass, was also falling.”
———————–

Wind and solar are the future of energy production.

Harquebus on Sat, 9th Jun 2012 1:22 am 



Wind and solar electrical generation is a waste of precious fossil fuel energy. It is impossible to grow these inefficient energy sources without injecting more fossil fuels.
Kenz300 is full of it as usual.

BillT on Sat, 9th Jun 2012 2:16 am 



ALL renewables require OIL to exist. ALL of them. And when oil is gone they too will fade into the sunset.

And, don’t you remember that the Empire slapped a 30%+ tariff on solar panels from China? You cannot have it both ways sheeple. Either you get cheap goods from Asia or your have very low wages in the Empire. Which do you want? But then, if you are only making $5 per hour, those panels you make will still be too expensive for you to use.

kiwichick on Sat, 9th Jun 2012 2:19 am 



dear harquebus

fossil fuel energy is

a) finite and non renewable

b) increasing in price as depletion erodes production from the mature and cheaply extracted fields

c)fossil fuels have driven a bubble in human population which now must be deflated

Harquebus on Sat, 9th Jun 2012 4:15 pm 



Hi kiwichick.
You are right. Population control, resource and consumption management using quotas not unfair taxes and reforestation are the only things we can and must do.
Fossil fuel energy is millions of years worth of concentrated solar energy. If we wait around another fifty million years or more, we’ll have some more.
I suppose we could call that renewable.