This is quite the turnaround from the IEA’s astonishing report issued in 2021 entitled “Net Zero by 2050: A Roadmap for the Global Energy Sector.”
Wonderful, nobody should ever forget that statement and the IEA should have their nose rubbed in it regularly!
In the same month they released a report on the need for massive quantities of “energy transition minerals” such as lithium, graphite, nickel and rare-earth metals required for the green transition.
In cautious and bureaucratic language the report noted that the world doesn’t have the capacity to meet the demand and there are no plans to fund and build the necessary mines and refineries.
The agency received a lot of publicity for their recommendation about putting a stop to coal and gas projects but there has been less attention to their 287-page report on The Role of Critical Minerals in Clean Energy Transitions.
Thank you Tilak. How can it be possible that I have never heard of you before? How can it also be possible that the IEA, as an organisation, keep Fatih Birol employed after $trillions have been spent on delivering "net zero" to such very little (actually negative) effect on global CO2 emissions?
Trump can clearly slow down the green transition in the USA, but he won't have much impact on the speed of change in the rest of the world.
The big swinger is, of course, China. China is committed to peaking CO2 emissions before 2030, followed by reducing them.
And China's progress at the moment is astonishing - installing more wind and solar in 2023 and 2024 than the rest of the world put together, and with BEV+PHEV sales exceeding 50% over the last 6 months. And, while the resulting new wind and solar generation is currently constrained by transmission line bottlenecks, China is spending around $85bn per year on transmission lines.
So what is the bottom line here? Well we don't know for sure, but Michael Barnard, who has been monitoring and reporting on China for years, thinks that by 2035, China's CO2 emissions will reduce below those of the USA. Currently USA emissions are 40% of those of China.
Europe also isn't going to let up on the green transition.
Further, Trump should be gone within 4 years, and we shall see what happens in 2028.
Now Birol is head of the IEA, and hopes to stay as IEA head. He clearly has to tone down the rhetoric while Trump is in charge of the US, if he wants to stay in place. But the IEA reports don't really control anything. They don't represent country government targets.
The IEA has not completely shed its status as the laughing stock of green energy analysis. This was for its series of World Energy Outlook reports which didn't acknowledge the exponential growth pattern of solar PV installs each year.
This is quite the turnaround from the IEA’s astonishing report issued in 2021 entitled “Net Zero by 2050: A Roadmap for the Global Energy Sector.”
Wonderful, nobody should ever forget that statement and the IEA should have their nose rubbed in it regularly!
In the same month they released a report on the need for massive quantities of “energy transition minerals” such as lithium, graphite, nickel and rare-earth metals required for the green transition.
In cautious and bureaucratic language the report noted that the world doesn’t have the capacity to meet the demand and there are no plans to fund and build the necessary mines and refineries.
The agency received a lot of publicity for their recommendation about putting a stop to coal and gas projects but there has been less attention to their 287-page report on The Role of Critical Minerals in Clean Energy Transitions.
Thank you Tilak. How can it be possible that I have never heard of you before? How can it also be possible that the IEA, as an organisation, keep Fatih Birol employed after $trillions have been spent on delivering "net zero" to such very little (actually negative) effect on global CO2 emissions?
Trump can clearly slow down the green transition in the USA, but he won't have much impact on the speed of change in the rest of the world.
The big swinger is, of course, China. China is committed to peaking CO2 emissions before 2030, followed by reducing them.
And China's progress at the moment is astonishing - installing more wind and solar in 2023 and 2024 than the rest of the world put together, and with BEV+PHEV sales exceeding 50% over the last 6 months. And, while the resulting new wind and solar generation is currently constrained by transmission line bottlenecks, China is spending around $85bn per year on transmission lines.
See https://climateenergyfinance.org/wp-content/uploads/2025/02/MONTHLY-CHINA-ENERGY-UPDATE-Feb-2025.pdf.
So what is the bottom line here? Well we don't know for sure, but Michael Barnard, who has been monitoring and reporting on China for years, thinks that by 2035, China's CO2 emissions will reduce below those of the USA. Currently USA emissions are 40% of those of China.
See MB's article at https://cleantechnica.com/2024/09/30/china-likely-to-have-lower-ghg-emissions-than-usa-by-2035/.
Europe also isn't going to let up on the green transition.
Further, Trump should be gone within 4 years, and we shall see what happens in 2028.
Now Birol is head of the IEA, and hopes to stay as IEA head. He clearly has to tone down the rhetoric while Trump is in charge of the US, if he wants to stay in place. But the IEA reports don't really control anything. They don't represent country government targets.
The IEA has not completely shed its status as the laughing stock of green energy analysis. This was for its series of World Energy Outlook reports which didn't acknowledge the exponential growth pattern of solar PV installs each year.
So if you want a good laugh, take a look at https://x.com/AukeHoekstra/status/1507047932226375688. It is an excellent example of what is unkindly known as "Planners Dr**p".