This year has dealt several blows to the climate fight. In 2025, after the inauguration of President Donald Trump, the United States, one of the world’s top emitters, retreated from a series of climate and clean energy goals. Moreover, it has become increasingly evident that governments will fail to achieve the target of limiting global warming to 1.5 degrees as stipulated in the Paris Agreement; fossil fuel carbon emissions are projected to reach a [missing value] by the end of the year.
However, the world has witnessed a number of clean energy successes as countries make progress in adopting clean energy. In the [missing value], solar and wind power surpassed coal as the primary source of electricity in the first half of 2025 – a promising step towards reducing emissions.
“It indicates a lot of truly important aspects about the trends within the energy sector as a whole, and the direction is clearly towards lower emissions,” says Jonathan Elkind, a senior research scholar at the Columbia University Center on Global Energy Policy.
Globally, solar energy has become more affordable and accessible, paving the way for many around the world to embrace it. In 2024, 91% of newly commissioned renewable power projects were more cost – effective than any new fossil fuel alternatives, according to data from [missing agency], a global intergovernmental agency for energy transformation.
“If you don’t have a tariff on your renewable energy, which most countries outside the U.S. don’t, you’ll likely pay $60 for a solar panel. Most people in the world can afford that,” says Dave Jones, the chief analyst at Ember, a global energy think tank.
Pakistan stands out as an example of this trend. [missing percentage] of its utility electricity was generated from solar as of June this year, well above the global average. “Solar panels have appeared on every roof, everywhere. They’re on large luxury villas and smaller, poorer residences, on factories and government buildings, hospitals and universities,” says Jones. “There has been a huge surge in solar growth, and a large part of it was funded by individuals who can access cheaper electricity than what they could get from their grid company.”
In June 2025, solar power became the European Union’s largest source of electricity for the first time. Meanwhile, some central European countries, including Hungary, Poland, and Slovakia, have seen solar generation grow at [missing rate] the E.U. average rate since 2019.
China has also made significant investments in renewable energy both at home and abroad, adding [missing amount] as much solar capacity as the rest of the world combined. And the country is likely to reach peak coal generation this year, says Jones, meaning the amount of coal used in the country will start to decline from now on.
Even in the United States, where the Trump Administration is instead promoting investment in fossil fuels, renewable energy saw some growth this year, especially after the Administration announced that it would phase out many of the Biden Administration’s tax breaks for renewable energy at the end of this year. Homeowners across the U.S. installed solar panels before the tax credit expired.
According to data released by the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission in November, solar and wind together accounted for 88% of the new U.S. electrical generating capacity added in the first eight months of 2025.
The clean energy sector rushed to secure federal tax – credit eligibility for wind and solar projects before the credits expired. [missing entity] estimates that 76% of solar projects and 86% of wind projects that were scheduled to come online by the end of 2028 will receive the Biden – era tax credits.
Although the Administration’s policies may lead to some contraction in the clean energy sector in the country, Elkind says that the clean energy movement is unlikely to be easily extinguished in the U.S.
“There will be a certain degree of clean energy capacity that won’t materialize due to the pullbacks and policy reversals, but it would be a mistake to write off the clean energy industries because the competitive alternatives aren’t looking very good,” he says.
Renewable energy is becoming too attractive to ignore. Globally, the capacity for renewable power is set to [missing verb] in 2025, according to data from Ember. This brings the global goal of tripling renewables by 2030 within reach.
“There are many reasons to be encouraged that we can actually achieve this,” says Elkind. “We can develop a variety of zero – carbon resources.”