In the Face of War and Pestilence, Clean Energy Keeps Growing
BP’s new data on world energy use show a rebound in fossil fuels, but wind and solar accounted for most of the growth in demand.
Clean power keeps growing.
Photographer: Lee Celano/AFP via Getty ImagesCovid-19’s remission wasn’t great for the energy transition. That’s the headline from BP Plc’s latest Statistical Review of World Energy.
But 2021 was kind of a Newtonian year: an equal but opposite reaction to 2020’s pandemic-induced plunge. And not completely equal either. Although global oil demand rebounded by 5.5 million barrels a day, it remained below its pre-pandemic level. The International Energy Agency doesn’t expect demand to surpass 2019 until 2023. Coal consumption, for its part, jumped past 2019’s total, though didn’t quite reach its all-time peak of 2014. Only natural gas comfortably hit a new record. Still, fossil fuels rule the world, supplying 82% of primary energy demand.