India becomes world’s third-largest solar power generator

New Delhi: India has became the world’s third-largest producer of electricity from wind and solar energy in 2024. India surpassed Germany. The sixth edition of global energy think tank Ember’s Global Electricity Review revealed this.

According to the report, wind and solar together generated 15 per cent of global electricity last year. India’s share stood at 10 per cent. The report said low-carbon sources, including renewables and nuclear power, together provided 40.9 per cent of the world’s electricity in 2024. This is the first time the 40 per cent mark has been crossed since the 1940s.

In India, clean sources accounted for 22 per cent of the electricity generation. Hydropower contributed the most at 8 per cent, while wind and solar together accounted for 10 per cent.

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Globally, renewables led the growth in clean electricity, adding a record 858 terawatt hours (TWh) in 2024 — 49 per cent more than the previous record in 2022. Solar was the largest source of new electricity for the third straight year, adding 474 TWh in 2024. It was also the fastest-growing power source for the 20th year in a row. In just three years, global solar power generation doubled to 6.9 per cent of the electricity mix.

India, too, saw a rapid increase in solar power. Solar contributed 7 per cent of the country’s electricity in 2024, the generation doubling since 2021. India added 24 gigawatts (GW) of solar capacity in 2024, more than twice the addition in 2023, becoming the third-largest market after China and the US. It also recorded the fourth-largest increase in solar generation globally, adding 20 TWh.

The report along with an open dataset on electricity generation in 2024, covers 88 countries that account for 93 per cent of global electricity demand and includes historic data for 215 countries.

In 2021, India also announced a goal of achieving 500 GW of non-fossil fuel capacity by 2030. The report from Ember in February said India will fail to deploy 500 GW renewable energy capacity by 2030 if the funding is not increased by 20 per cent annually from current levels.