WEMO 2025 (complet) - Flipbook - Page 76
03 Energy transition: countries perspective
Meanwhile, the explosive growth of energy-intensive sectors like data
centers and arti昀椀cial intelligence has made energy security and grid
e昀케ciency a top national priority. Within the European Union, clean energy
investments remain strong, supported by ambitious climate policies, but
challenged by other nations’ priorities. In Germany, total investment in
renewables has more than doubled from €14.6 billion in 2021 to €38 billion
in 2023, before slightly declining to €32 billion in 2024. However, lagging
investment in grid (and related projects length) and storage infrastructure
hinders further scale-up. Looking at an emerging economy, India has rapidly
expanded clean energy investment, with 83% of 2024 power sector funding
going to renewables (mainly solar PV), bringing non-fossil capacity up to
44% and attracting the world’s highest development 昀椀nance funding. Still,
challenges like high 昀椀nancing costs, o昀昀-taker risk from indebted distribution
companies, and inadequate transmission infrastructure continue to hinder
projects viability and renewable integration in the country.
To meet global climate goals, the pace of the energy transition must
accelerate. While growing investment in renewable power generation is
essential and must even grow further, it’s equally important that
spending on power grids, storage, other cleantechs and energy
e昀케ciency keeps up. These areas are critical to managing the increasing
share of renewables in the energy mix and ensuring a stable, reliable,
and cost-e昀昀ective energy system.
FIGURE 8
Annual energy investments per country and sector (2024) [USD bn]
Source: iea
