The Trump administration’s rhetorical attacks on renewable energy for allegedly threatening grid stability (it doesn’t), and its determination to resuscitate a domestic coal industry plagued by poor economics, have not quenched a global appetite for renewables that is set to climb slightly in 2017, according to Bloomberg New Energy Finance.
In a post announcing the release of a 72-page report drilling down into the subject (registration required), Bloomberg writes that its latest survey of clean energy investment “indicates a firm third quarter, suggesting global clean energy investment for the whole of 2017 may slightly exceed 2016’s total of US$287.5 billion.” The report reverses the outlook a year ago, when the same market assessment reported a “worrying” drop in global clean financing.
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“Seven giant wind projects, each costing between $600 million and $4.5 billion, and spread between the U.S., Mexico, the U.K., Germany, China, and Australia, helped global clean energy investment to jump 40% year-on-year” in the latest quarter, the outlet adds. “The standout deal of the quarter was the 2-GW Wind Catcher project in the Oklahoma Panhandle, costing $4.5 billion.”
In other details, BNEF found that third-quarter investment was up 3% around the world from the second quarter, and that “numbers for the July-to-September quarter mean that investment in 2017 so far is running 2% above that in the same period of last year, suggesting that the annual total is likely to finish up close to, or a little ahead of, 2016’s figure of $287.5 billion.”
A 72% jump in financing of utility-scale renewable energy projects compared to the same quarter of last year suggests their growing acceptance among mainstream utilities. At $34.3 billion in Q3, global wind investment edged out solar spending of $30.5 billion.
