The European Commission has launched legal action against all but one of its 27 members for failing to take action on a key renewable energy pledge, just days before a global analysis revealed only a tepid response to an international commitment to triple renewables deployment by 2030.

In late July, the EC launched “infringement procedures” against all member countries but Denmark for failing to fully transpose the continent’s 2023 renewable energy target of 42.5% by 2030 into their national laws. The target, part of the Green Deal climate package that was meant to “turbocharge green energy across the bloc,” included detailed sectoral targets for transport and heating, Energywire reports, as well as the power sector. “The law took on increased prominence as energy prices soared following Russia’s all-out invasion of Ukraine, with EU industry consistently arguing high prices were damaging their competitiveness.”

The 2023 regulations “aim to accelerate the deployment of renewable energy in all sectors of the economy, not only in the power sector, but also and especially in those sectors where progress is more difficult like heating and cooling, buildings, transport, and industry, where we have also set new or strengthened targets,” the EC decision note stated. “They set important horizontal and crosscutting measures to promote the deployment of renewables, such as the strengthening of guarantees of origin, facilitating energy system integration through the promotion of electrification and renewable hydrogen, and safeguards to ensure a more sustainable bioenergy production.”

But when the May 21, 2025 deadline rolled around, only Denmark had fully adopted the target in its national laws. The July 23 notice gives the other countries two months to complete the process or face a “reasoned opinion”, the next step in the continent’s legal process.

A week later, the Ember global energy think tank reported that European countries aren’t the only laggards. Nearly two years after countries reached a landmark agreement at the COP28 climate summit to triple renewable energy deployment and double the pace of energy efficiency improvements by the end of this decade, only seven countries outside the European Union and 22 in total have updated their targets.

Nine of the world’s top 20 power producers—including Canada, China, Russia, South Africa, Türkiye, and the United States —have failed to come forward with updates, though Ember said it expects news from China and South Africa this year.

The national targets add up to 7.4 terawatts, just 2% more than the countries’ plans as of November 2023, and far short of the 11 TW that will be needed to meet the COP28 goal.

“The purpose of a national renewables target is less to force more renewables to be built, but rather to make sure they are built smarter,” report author Dr. Katye Altieri, global electricity analyst at Ember, said in a release.

But “there seems to be a disconnect between countries making global pledges and commitments at COP and then translating that into national commitments,” she told The Energy Mix in an email. “It’s almost as if signing the pledge and agreeing to the text is seen as sufficient without having to restate national ambition.”

Yet “the COP28 pledge to triple global renewables remains one of the single biggest actions this decade for remaining on the 1.5°C climate pathway.”

While it isn’t unusual for countries to make big promises at UN climate conferences, then walk them back rhetorically in the months that follow, Altieri said that isn’t happening here.

The statement of intention “still remains, and was actually followed up at COP29 with the grids and storage pledge,” she told The Mix. “We just have not seen the explicit stated national commitments by individual countries in response to the COP pledge.”

In July, the International Renewable Energy Agency reported that 91% of new utility-scale renewables projects in 2024 were less expensive than the cheapest fossil fuel alternatives. Onshore wind led the pack at US3.4¢ per kilowatt-hour, followed by new photovoltaic solar at 4.3¢ and hydropower at 5.7¢. Cost rose slightly for some technologies between 2023 and 2024—0.6% for solar, 3% for onshore wind, 4% for offshore wind, and 13% for bioenergy—while battery storage costs plummeted 92% between 2010 and 2024.

The International Energy Agency says renewables will overtake coal to become the world’s top source of electricity “by 2026 at the latest,” Carbon Brief writes.