042 043 Green or greed? Finding the truth in the world of sustainable energy investments Charles Meldrum With 40% of the UK’s national grid supplied by renewable energy sources in 2022, the target of net zero emissions is closer than we may think, but is this figure dependable, and is this target financially possible? Is it even practical to invest into this industry or will we be forced to work with our finite resources until the very end? In 2020, over £40 billion was invested into the renewable energy industry, which caused a doubling of the renewable energy share of the electricity supply pie, from 15% to 30%. This is good, as it shows that investment in the industry breeds results and has a positive impact. However, in 2022, the supply of energy from fossil fuel also increased, albeit at a slower rate than renewable energy production. This may be due to aftermath of the COVID-19 crisis, during which many coal powered fire stations in the UK and the rest of Europe had their life extended in order to keep up with the demand for cheap energy, which meant fossil fuels remain with the majority 42% in electricity production, keeping us far away from our target of net zero by 2050. Furthermore, in 2022, the UK economy benefited from $3.59 billion terawatt hours of exported electricity. Supported by the fact that in May 2022, we peaked at having 73% of our electricity supplied by renewable sources, this means we almost have the capability to be fully reliant on renewable energy sources, and in future, make a profit from it. However, this occurred primarily during the summer months, when less energy is consumed overall whereas, in the winter months when energy is in high demand, the renewable energy industry will suffer. This is especially true with solar power in low supply during the winter months, making the price exceedingly high for consumers and not sustainable in the long term, and non-renewable sources of energy will have to be brought in as backup. In 2021, China invested $266 billion into the wind and solar power industry (48GW of wind turbines and 53GW of solar capacity), marking a 19% increase in their total capacity. And this makes up a huge 35% of global investment in 2021, meaning that the rest of the world is far less monetarily invested in this issue, suggesting a lack of confidence in the industry. Globally, in 2022, $1.1 trillion was invested in the renewable energy industry, a jump of $250 billion since 2021. This mostly involved huge investment in wind turbines and solar cells, as well as more than 10-million-unit sales of electric vehicles around the globe. Sixty percent of these EV sales took place in China after they invested over $500 billion into the renewable energy industry, telling us that the rest of the world is leaving it until the last moment to invest and subsidise this industry further, to make use of our increasing renewable electricity supply. This is especially worrying when in the UK, petrol and diesel powered cars will not be produced after 2035, meaning we may not have the infrastructure to support the increased demand of electric vehicles by that time if we do not invest now. Innovative technologies such as Carbon capture received a fractional investment of $6.3 billion globally. Even though this was a very minimal investment, this is more than triple the investment in the year prior. The output is proving to be incredible. With countries such as Norway and the USA taking on these projects in the early 1970s, it is experimental technology that has proved to be remarkably successful and inexpensive, with the USA having the potential to contain 27 million tonnes of carbon dioxide per annum, which is the equivalent to the emissions of over fifteen million cars yearly. In conclusion, there seems to be a positive correlation between the investment in renewable energy sources, and the extreme growth of the industry, whether that be in subsidies in the construction of wind turbines or investment into new technologies like carbon capture. It suggests that investment would surely bring growth, and would bring us closer to net zero, but the rate of that happening is still to be seen.
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