2017 was an exciting year for renewable energy with reduced prices for solar and wind installation, and China beating its own targets for solar energy and renewables investment.
Here, we take a look at the trends for 2018 and look forward to another positive year of growth in the industry:
Renewable energy costs will continue to fall
Since 2009 Solar prices have dropped by about 62%, while offshore wind costs have almost halved reaching £57 per megawatt hour in 2017. According to a new report this is going to continue falling and renewable energy is set to be cheaper than fossil fuels in just two years.
This rapid fall in the cost of renewable energy is due to endless technological advances that are continuously being made. It is sad that the current cost for fossil fuel is around 4p to 12p per kilowatt hour across G20 countries and by 2020, IREA have predicted that renewables will cost between 2p and 7p.
Electric cars will become more common
Last year registrations of electric and plug-in hybrid cars in the UK increased by a record-breaking 27%. The highest amount of sales came from the country’s capital, London but almost 20% that were sold in the UK last year were registered in the East of England.
It is now being estimated that 60,000 low emission plug-in vehicles will be sold in 2018, which will mean a total of 200,000 running on British roads.
The best-selling of all plug-in models last year was the Mitsubishi Outlander PHEV, which soared above models such as the BMW 3 series 330e (plug-in hybrid) and the Mercedes C-Class (plug-in hybrid).
Waste-to-Energy Progress
Waste management is a growing issue and governments are turning to waste-to-energy facilities to control landfill expansion. New Delhi and China in particular have both made waste-to-energy a priority due to serious landfill dilemmas.
Over the next five years New Delhi expects city waste to require an area equal to 7% of the city’s land. Therefore, to resolve the issue, the Indian Government is hoping to build a waste-to-energy plant that would process one-third of the city’s waste. In China, it’s leading player in the environmental protection industry – China Everbright International – has secured its eighteenth waste-to-energy project in Shandong province alone.
Reduce your CO2 emissions
There is still a lot of progress to be made in putting a waste-to-energy policy in place, which in turn would drive the infrastructure build out for this industry.
Here at Falcon Energy we know how important renewable energy is and we offer a range of services and great advice to property and business owners. Get in contact to discuss how we could help you to become a more sustainable property/business.