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Austria 2026 Executive summary
Austria has one of the most ambitious climate and energy targets in the world; achieving them requires actionable delivery strategies and adequate funding. The country’s commitments to climate neutrality by 2040 – a full decade ahead of the European Union (EU) – and a 100% renewable share in the national annual electricity balance by 2030 are bold. These goals are underpinned by a large hydropower fleet (accounting for around 60% of electricity generation), including 5.6 gigawatts (GW) of pumped hydro storage and a nationwide smart meter roll-out. Austria has the highest share of renewable energy in electricity consumption in the…
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Renewables 2021 Renewable heat
Recent trends Global progress on conversion to renewable heat has been limited Heat is the world’s largest energy end use, accounting for almost half of global final energy consumption in 2021, significantly more than electricity (20%) and transport (30%). Industrial processes are responsible for 51% of the energy consumed for heat, while another 46% is consumed in buildings for space and water heating, and, to a lesser extent, cooking. The remainder is used in agriculture, primarily for greenhouse heating. Global heat demand declined by 2% in 2020, primarily due to the curtailment of economic activity as a result of…
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Corine Nsangwe Businge
Energy Efficiency Policy Analyst.
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Global Methane Tracker 2026 Recent insights from methane emissions studies
Advances in measurement and data processing Methane detection has improved markedly in recent years by making better use of existing satellite arrays and launching new devices, improving airborne instrumentation and calibration, and deploying tower, stationary and handheld detectors more widely. Overall, detection limits have been optimised, coverage has broadened and observation times have increased. Meanwhile, advances in data processing have enhanced both the speed and the quality of analysis.These advances yield better coverage and sharper insights into the sources and scale of methane emissions. They also confirm that effective methane management requires multi-scale measurement frameworks that combine space…
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Kandeh Yumkella
Chairman of the Presidential Initiative on Climate Change, Renewable Energy and Food Security.
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Renewables 2022 Renewable heat
Recent trends and policy update Heating is the world’s largest energy end use, accounting for almost half of global final energy consumption. Industrial processes are responsible for 53% of the final energy consumed for heat, while another 44% is used in buildings for space and water heating and, to a lesser extent, cooking. The remainder is used in agriculture, primarily for greenhouse heating. The heating sector is largely dominated by fossil fuels, with renewable energy sources meeting less than one-quarter of global heat demand in 2021 (and the traditional use of biomass makes up half this amount).With…
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Portugal 2026 Executive summary
Thanks to steady expansion of hydropower, wind power generation and solar photovoltaics (PV) in recent years, Portugal has one of the lowest carbon intensities of electricity generation among IEA Member countries. Portugal is entering a mid‑transition that requires managing two interconnected energy systems that are moving in opposite directions: one is based on renewables and electrification and must scale up rapidly; the other is a legacy fossil fuel system that must decline in an orderly way to avoid stranded assets and price shocks. Electricity is becoming the central pillar of energy security and the main driver of emissions reductions.Portugal…
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World Energy Employment 2025 Executive summary
In 2024, global energy employment growth outpaced job gains in the wider economy for the third year in a row. Continued strong investment in energy infrastructure underpinned expanding energy employment, up by 2.2%, nearly double the economy-wide rate of 1.3%, bringing total energy sector jobs to 76 million. Since 2019, 5.4 million energy workers have been added – about 2.4% of all new jobs globally. In some countries, its contribution is far larger, reaching one in five new jobs in China and one in ten in the United States since 2022. The pace of the expansion in recent…
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Rigathi Gachagua
H.E. Rigathi Gachagua, EGH. Deputy President
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World Energy Outlook 2025 Net Zero Emissions by 2050
Acting now to limit overshoot The Paris Agreement set the global goal of limiting warming to well below 2 °C and pursuing efforts to limit it to 1.5 °C. The IEA Net Zero Emissions by 2050 Scenario (NZE Scenario) translates the 1.5 °C goal into a global pathway for the energy sector. The updated NZE Scenario presented here takes account of the most recent data and trends. Each country will tailor its own path to net zero emissions. The updated NZE Scenario is based on four central pillars that are widely applicable: clean energy electrification, energy efficiency, low-emissions fuels and methane abatement. The…
