The collapse in solar and wind costs and the energy transition
- Date
- 2010s-2020s
- Category
- Science, technology & invention
- Region
- Global
- Era
- Contemporary
- Significance
Across the 2010s and into the 2020s the cost of renewable electricity fell so steeply that solar and wind became the cheapest sources of new power generation across most of the world, transforming the economics of decarbonisation.
According to the International Renewable Energy Agency, between 2010 and 2024 the total installed cost of solar photovoltaics dropped by around 87 percent and onshore wind by roughly 55 percent, while the cost of battery storage fell by about 93 percent. By 2024 the great majority of newly commissioned utility-scale renewable capacity-some 91 percent-generated power more cheaply than the lowest-cost new fossil-fuel alternative. Driven by manufacturing scale-up (particularly in China), technological improvement and supportive policy, global solar and wind deployment grew exponentially, and renewables overtook coal in many markets. This shift turned climate mitigation from a purely cost-bearing exercise into one increasingly aligned with economic self-interest, reshaping energy investment, geopolitics and the trajectory of global emissions, even as fossil-fuel use continued to grow in absolute terms.
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Further reading
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