A flurry of summits this week across Dubai addressed the threat of climate change, or at least acknowledged that a pivot away from fossil fuels toward cleaner sources of power is needed to keep temperatures from rising.
The world must take “radical action” by investing $5.7 trillion in private and public money each year through 2030 to shift away from fossil fuels and ensure the planetary warming they cause doesn’t pass dangerous thresholds, the International Renewable Energy Agency says.
Almost two-thirds of wind and solar projects built globally last year will be able to generate cheaper electricity than even the world’s cheapest new coal plants, according to a report from the International Renewable Energy Agency.
Canada added fewer megawatts of renewable energy capacity in 2020 than any of its G7 counterparts, according to new figures from the International Renewable Energy Agency (IRENA). However, there's more to this.
“We sometimes get obsessed with the absolute number. We should be thinking about the quality and types of jobs that end up coming into a Canadian environment," says Stewart Beck, head of the Asia Pacific Foundation of Canada.
Clean tech advocates say there’s more to the story, in particular when it comes to the potential for manufacturing, like a recent deal to produce electric vehicles in Ontario.
Canada has become a member of a key intergovernmental agency that promotes the adoption of solar, wind, geothermal and other forms of renewable energy.
Asia is leading the global surge in renewable energy jobs. In 2017, the renewable energy industry broke a symbolic threshold, employing over 10 million people, according to the International Renewable Energy Association's latest research.
An annual International Renewable Energy Agency report tallied 9.8 million clean energy sector jobs globally in 2015-2016, including 3.1 million jobs in the solar PV sector.
Governments who are thinking about approving major fossil fuel projects should think carefully about the consequences about what happens when the infrastructure becomes obsolete.