Climate & Energy
Clean energy scaling, emissions bending, and the systems that power the world getting cleaner.
Battery storage passed 100 gigawatts in a single year for the first time
The world added 108 gigawatts of battery storage in 2025, 40 percent more than in 2024, leaving its fleet eleven times the size it was in 2021. Batteries are now the fastest growing power technology there is.
EU deaths from fine particle pollution fell 57 percent, clearing a 2030 target seven years early
The European Union set out to cut premature deaths from air pollution by 55 percent by 2030, measured against 2005. Its environment agency counted a 57 percent fall for fine particles by 2023.
India's power fleet is now 54 percent non-fossil, five years ahead of its Paris pledge
India promised the world that about half its power-generating fleet would be non-fossil by 2030. It passed that mark in June 2025 and now stands at 54.18 percent. Where the electricity actually comes from is a slower story.
Solar supplied a quarter of the EU's electricity in June
For the first time in a single month, solar generated 25 percent of the European Union's electricity, more than any other source.
China's CO2 emissions dipped in 2025 as clean power kept expanding
China's carbon emissions dipped about 0.3% in 2025, extending a 21-month run of flat or falling emissions that, for the first time on record, is not tied to an economic slowdown.
Coal fell below half of China's electricity for the first time
Coal supplied 49.7 percent of China's electricity from January to June 2026, the first half year below half in the world's largest power system, with renewables at about 40 percent.
Electric cars reached one in four new cars sold worldwide
Global electric car sales rose about 20% to more than 20 million in 2025, roughly a quarter of all new cars sold.
The ozone layer keeps healing, and 2025's hole was among the smallest in decades
The 2025 Antarctic ozone hole was the fifth smallest since 1992, confirming a recovery driven by a 1987 agreement.
For the first time in a century, renewables out-generated coal
In 2025 the world crossed a line that had held since the age of steam: cleaner sources produced more of our electricity than coal did.
