Renewable investments hit USD 310bn in 2014

Green energy investments worldwide have grown by 15.6% year-on-year to USD 310 billion (EUR 283.28bn) in 2014 and were mostly focused on solar and wind power, according to the Global Renewable Energy Report 2015.

The photovoltaic (PV) industry in particular attracted more than USD 149.6 billion, or 48.3% of the total, the English version of the report released by Hanergy Holding Group and China New Energy Chamber of Commerce (CNECC) showed on Thursday. While solar financing grew by 3.6% on the year, the world’s cumulative installed PV capacity reached 188.8 GW with 47 GW added over the past year alone.

China, Japan and the US led the 2014 global solar expansion, followed by promising new markets like the UK. Apart from the common ground-mounted solar farms and distributed generation (DG) arrays, the concept of mobile energy along with PV technology integration and civilian product application also began to gain momentum.

All in all, renewable power generation was 19% higher as compared to 2013, accounting for some 6.2% of the total global electricity consumption. Per segment, wind power generation grew by 20% and solar power generation jumped by 42% during the period under review.

(USD 1.0 = EUR 0.914)

Choose your newsletter by Renewables Now. Join for free!