China leading world in renewable energy investments
China will lead the world in renewable energy investments in the years to 2020 but slow progress of commercial projects and red tape threaten to curb spending growth.
China will lead the world in renewable energy investments in the years to 2020 but slow progress of commercial projects and red tape threaten to curb spending growth.
Investment in new renewable power capacity is seen averaging at more than US$230 billion annually worldwide in the run-up to 2020, compared with US$250 billion last year, according to the International Energy Agency's annual medium-term renewable energy market report released yesterday.
The report links the decline to expectations of unit investment costs for some technologies as well as a likely slowdown in global capacity growth.
Expansion of renewables such as wind, solar and hydro projects will slow down unless policy uncertainty is diminished, the report says. The policy uncertainties stem mainly from concerns about costs of deploying renewables, according to the IEA.
Policy and regulatory uncertainty is rising in some key markets
"Just when renewables are becoming a cost-competitive option in an increasing number of cases, policy and regulatory uncertainty is rising in some key markets," said IEA executive director Maria van der Hoeven.