Shares of most of the “fuel” electricity generation in Europe moved negatively last year, as according to data recently published by Eurostat, their participation in the mix was affected by the reduction of electricity consumption due to the pandemic. In this rule, however, the “bright” exception was renewable energy sources, which continued to advance.
According to Eurostat, unlike RES, the participation of fossil fuels in electricity generation reached a record low. Thus, their share recorded a “dip” by 9.8% compared to 2019, reaching 1,022 Terawatt Hours (TWh) of electricity last year, from 1,133 TWh a year earlier.
Nuclear power generation also declined, with preliminary data showing that a negative record was also set in 2020, according to Eurostat. As a result, 683,000 terawatt hours of electricity were generated by nuclear power plants last year, 6.3% lower than in 1990. .
“Champion” the RES
On the other hand, electricity production from RES is breaking one record after another in the last decade. In fact, 2020 is a milestone for their penetration in Europe, as according to preliminary data, the production of “green” electricity exceeded for the first time the quantities of electricity derived from fossil fuels.
More specifically, the share of renewables has more than tripled in the last thirty years, reaching 980,000 Terawatt Hours in 2019, from 303,000 GWh in 1990. Last year’s performance improved even more in 2020, when it exceeded 1 million Terawatt Hours.
Oil and gas
The huge drop in consumption of oil and petroleum products and the modest moderate reduction in gas, which occurred in 2020, are in stark contrast to the trend of previous years. Preliminary data for last year show that the consumption of oil and petroleum products decreased by 12.9% compared to 2019. With the reference year in 2005, the consumption of oil and petroleum products fell by 23.1% last year.
In contrast, gas consumption was less affected in 2020 by pandemic containment measures, with the reduction limited to only 2.6% compared to 2019. However, with a reference year of 2005, the decline reached 8.9%.
At the same time, coal consumption continued to decline sharply, following the effects of the pandemic combined with those of coal emission policies. Compared to 2019, preliminary data for 2020 show an average reduction of 19% in fossil fuel consumption.
