Electricity is vital to modern day life and is fundamentally
important to the economic development of nations such as China
and India. Two-thirds of the world’s electricity is generated by
burning fossil fuels. And the International Energy Association
has estimated that 37 per cent of the world’s man-made carbon
dioxide emissions are the result of electricity generation.
Carbon dioxide is the number one greenhouse gas, and a key
driver of climate change. Electricity can be generated using
less polluting, renewable resources, and a few countries such as
Iceland and Paraguay already supply their entire electricity
demand using renewables. These are mainly largescale
hydroelectric schemes. Globally renewables account for around 19
per cent of electricity supply. But the real growth sector is
the so-called ‘new renewables’ such as solar and wind. Wind
power, which is already the second most important source of
renewable energy, is increasing at a rate of around 30 per cent
a year. Worldwide, installed capacity re