Climate Change and You: Sunny Side Up, or Down?

I spent some time recently to understand the journey of the renewable energy sector in India, particularly solar power. My interest was piqued by the fact that renewable energy (RE) capacity has surpassed 200 gigawatts, contributing nearly 45% to installed power capacity in India. Within renewables, solar capacity has seen a stellar 27-fold growth in less than a decade. And the best part is: a unit of electricity generated from solar energy costs as little as ₹2.5 per unit, nearly half the cost of thermal or coal-based electricity.

The natural question to ask then is: if solar is so cheap, why are we not producing more electricity using this endless resource? Currently, solar contributes less than 10% of electricity generated.

The answer is complex. Firstly, RE power from solar and wind is intermittent. Solar panels do not generate electricity after sunset and produce less than the potential on cloudy days. This sudden drop in generation during evenings when demand for power peaks, impacts the stability of electricity grids. For distribution companies or discoms who supply power to our homes and offices, this is a challenge. They have to arrange for backup power drawn from thermal or hydro projects to fill this gap. This adds to their cost because they have to pay fixed charges to thermal power plants even when they are not drawing power.

One way to avoid this problem is to store solar power in batteries. This raises costs and even the best available storage technologies offer only 2-4 hours of storage. This is one reason discoms are reluctant to get into solar purchase contracts. There are several others too which I have discussed in this Long Story published earlier this week.

Despite the headwinds discussed in the piece, the potential of renewable energy offers some much-needed hope. With advancements in RE storage technologies in future, one day we might be able to shun polluting fossil fuels altogether, and meet the ever-growing demand for energy without adding to carbon emissions and worsening the climate crisis.

State of the Climate

The global climate summit held in Dubai in 2023 set a target to triple renewable energy (RE) capacity worldwide and doubling of energy efficiency by 2030. This is critical to limiting global temperature increase to 1.5 degree Celsius and reaching net zero emissions by 2050.

Worldwide, the share of RE in electricity generation is rising with a steady increase in wind and solar power capacity. But these energy sources, including hydroelectric power, are highly dependent on climatic conditions. Simply put, how hot it gets impacts both the demand for energy and supplies from RE sources.

For instance, due to drier and warmer El Niño conditions in 2023, South America experienced a 3.9% increase in solar photovoltaic capacity factor (or how much electricity solar panels can produce, compared to their full potential) leading to an estimated 3.5 terra-watt hour of additional generation from the region’s 50 gigawatt (GW) installed capacity.

Integrating climate information into energy planning, therefore, is critical to navigating the challenges of climate variability, says a new assessment put together by the World Meteorological Organization, the International Renewable Energy Agency, and the Copernicus Climate Change Service.

The report said that developing countries can harness their renewable energy potential to address energy access challenges while leveraging information on climate variability.

Data from the report shows that global wind power installed capacity surpassed 1000 GW in 2023, a 13% increase year-on-year, and an impressive 190% increase when compared with levels a decade back. Solar, which has been growing even faster than wind, saw installed capacity growing by 32% (year-on-year) in 2023, and 680% when compared to 2014. And here’s some good news: renewables met nearly 30% of global electricity demand in 2022.

The news in brief

• It couldn’t be more ironic. Brazil is chopping parts of the Amazon rainforest to build highways to the city of Belem which will host the next climate summit.
• Institutions which facilitated the environment and wildlife clearances for a controversial mega infrastructure project in Great Nicobar islands, may end up receiving large conservation grants.
• Power demand across India stayed elevated in recent weeks with rising temperatures across the northern region. From makers of beverages and body washes to air-conditioners and deodorants, businesses are readying for a surge in sales, after the weather office’s prediction of a blazing summer this year.

Climate Change Tracker

As per the Copernicus Climate Change Service, also known as the C3S, if the 30-year warming trend leading up to February 2025 continues, global warming could hit the 1.5-degree Celsius limit by September 2029. According to C3S, long-term global warming has already reached 1.38 degrees in February this year.

The limit of 1.5 degrees above the pre-industrial average temperature (1850-1900) set by the Paris agreement in 2016 (and adopted by nearly 200 countries) is considered breached when global average temperature is over the limit for a period of two to three decades. This means that temperature thresholds can be breached several times, like in the recent years, but only a sustained increase over decades is considered as a breach of the Paris target.

While we are precipitously close to breaching a climate milestone, can you guess what the forecast was in December 2000? Back then, we were likely to breach the Paris target only by the year 2041! This means our past actions have preponed the date of a crisis.

A global warming of 1.5°C above the pre-industrial era is considered the threshold beyond which the consequences of climate change will become more difficult for human life and ecosystems. This could mean more frequent disasters and a heavier toll on all life on planet earth. We could be swinging between extreme heat, droughts, wildfires and deluges.

Know Your Jargon

BESS

Battery Energy Storage System, in short BESS, is a technology that stores electrical energy for later use. BESS is extremely critical to adoption of renewable energy (RE) like solar or wind which are intermittent in nature. Large utility-scale solar projects, for instance, can supply to the grid when the sun is up. But after sunset, a sudden drop in RE power supply can destabilise the electricity grid. Currently, electricity distribution companies (discoms) rely on thermal and hydro-power to maintain the supply.

BESS ensures that solar energy generated in the day can be used later, say in the evenings, when power demand usually picks. Improved battery technologies, therefore, raise the reliability of power supply from renewable sources. Currently, functional BESS projects supply around 2-4 hours of battery storage for renewable power projects.

As battery technologies turn cheaper, the cost of stored power will come down and this will increase further adoption of renewable sources. In India, the largest BESS project is a 40-megawatt solar power project in Rajnandgaon, Chhattisgarh, with 3 hours of battery storage.

Prime Number

13

13 of the world’s 20 most polluted cities are from India, says the 2024 global air quality report by IQAir. These include New Delhi, Gurugram, Noida, Greater Noida, Faridabad and the little-known town of Byrnihat in Meghalaya, which is also the most polluted city in the world.

The report which tracks 8,954 cities in 134 countries, found Mayaguez in Puerto Rico to be the least polluted. Data from the report show that India ranks fifth in the most polluted country list, after Chad, Bangladesh, Pakistan and the Democratic Republic of Congo.

The report is based on PM 2.5 concentration in the air, which are extremely fine particles with severe health consequences. Exposure to PM2.5, which can penetrate deep into the lungs and bloodstream, contributes to and exacerbates various health conditions, including asthma, cancer, stroke, and lung diseases.

An estimated 8.1 million deaths globally are attributed to air pollution. Dirty air is also the second leading cause of death for children under five, after malnutrition. Polluted air also outranks tobacco as a leading cause of death and disability.

Movie of the Month

What would the future look like if we embraced the best climate solutions available today? The documentary film 2040 is structured as a visual letter from a father to his four-year-old daughter Velvet.

In the film, director Damon Gameau explores solutions like rooftop solar and regenerative agriculture, meets experts and changemakers, and consults children who will inherit the planet. It’s a story of hope, and an imagined future vastly different from doomsday climate scenarios that we are fearful of.

That’s all, for now. Bibek will be back with the next issue, in a fortnight.