According to the Bloomberg report on Sustainable Energy, the wind and solar energy capacity has tripled in US since 2008.
In 2007, the renewable energy segment contributed just seven percent of the nation’s total energy portfolio which got doubled to 13 percent by 2014.
With this capacity addition, wind and solar have also become more cost competitive.
Bloomberg New Energy Finance also notes that wind energy is the lowest cost option for utilities in some parts of the U.S., and solar energy beats the retail electricity price paid by homeowners in many states.
The above data was revealed in Bloomberg’s newly released 2015 Sustainable Energy in America Factbook, prepared for the Business Council for Sustainable Energy.
According to the report, since 2007, United States has seen a massive investment of around $ 400 billion in clean energy assets.
Comparatively, the figure is less than the overall clean energy investment done by China last year.
As detailed by the report, during 2007 to 2014, electricity demand remained dull despite the economic boom in entire US.
Over the same time period, whole amount of carbon emissions released from the US energy sector also declined by nine percent.
It is to be noted that U.S. economy has strongly bounced back from the 2008-2009 economic depressions, leading to increased energy use as well as increased greenhouse gas emissions.
“With the growing economy, we are still seeing the energy productivity of the U.S. economy improving, and I think that’s extremely significant,” says Lisa Jacobson, president of the Business Council for Sustainable Energy.
Source: Bloomberg New Energy Finance/Business Council for Sustainable Energy
The figure above shows a measure of energy productivity: As GDP has increased since 1990, primary energy consumption has not kept pace.
America has to further devise various effective and advanced mechanisms to curtail greenhouse gas emissions.
In future, America needs to outline better policies that establish an actual price on carbon, bringing in a vast change for the system.
Meanwhile, the report also highlighted a 25 percent growth in natural gas production since 2007, propelled by the fracking revolution.
Nevertheless, this is a proven fact that America has propelled into a clean energy scenario where the changes documented were more real, systematic and structural, the report said.
Sabeena Wahid
editor@greentechlead.com