Executive summary

Solar surge halts fossil generation rise as renewables overtake coal

Record solar growth meant clean power sources grew fast enough to
meet all new electricity demand in 2025, thereby preventing an increase
in fossil generation. This was the first year since 2020 without an
increase in electricity generation from fossil fuels and only the fifth year
without a rise this century.

China and India, historically the largest contributors to the global rise in fossil power, both
recorded a fall in fossil generation in 2025. In both countries, record clean power additions
outpaced demand growth. This brought global net growth in fossil generation to a halt.
Solar power cemented its role as the dominant driver of change in the global power sector,
with its record growth meeting three-quarters of the net rise in electricity demand in 2025.
Solar’s rise was 18 times larger than that of gas, the only fossil fuel that increased in 2025.
Global solar generation is now the same size as the total electricity demand of the EU.

China once again led solar build-out, recording more than half of the global increase in both
solar capacity and solar generation in 2025. This pushed the share of solar and wind in
China’s generation mix to 22%, surpassing the OECD average (20%). India also ramped up
clean power deployment. Renewable generation growth doubled its previous record, and
India installed more new solar capacity than the United States for the first time.