(REPOST: Clean Energy News)
Electricity consumption rose in every European country apart from the UK, which also contributed the highest growth in renewables in the past three years alongside Germany, according to new analysis of the European power sector.
The findings, published by German thinktank Agora Energiewende & Sandbag Smarter Climate Policy, found that across Europe consumption increased by 0.7% (23 TWh) in 2017, the third year in a row that overall European electricity consumption has gone up.
However, the research estimates that the UK was the only country to not reflect this rise, blaming faltering energy efficiency progress, rising levels of industrial production, an increase of 3 million people over the last two years in Europe and additional power demand from new sectors such as digital and connected technologies for the rise across other member states.
Overall in 2017, renewables generated 30% of Europe’s electricity for the first time despite being only a rise of 0.2% owing to the huge growth in wind generation being almost completely offset by the lowest hydro electricity generation in a decade.
Geographically, the majority of that growth was in Germany and the UK alone with progress in the deployment of wind, solar and biomass in the UK, Germany and Denmark in particular seeing these technologies overtake generation from coal for the first time following a 12% increase in 2017.