China is ‘pulling ahead’ when it comes to the electrification of its economy, while the US risks ‘losing momentum’ and much of Europe remains stuck in the starting blocks, according to a new study by the We Mean Business Coalition.
The Electrification Competitiveness Index, which was developed alongside RMI, assessed 16 countries on the deployment of electrification and the conditions needed for further progress.
As it notes, a ‘widespread implementation gap’ is evident across most economies, with policy and other enabling conditions moving ahead of actual deployment.
Solid foundation
China, along with France and Spain are classed as having a ‘solid foundation’, combining relatively strong deployment with strong enabling conditions.
‘China has the highest deployment score, backed by coordinated grid investment, industrial policy and incentives,’ the report notes. ‘France and Spain score well on grid performance and clean power shares. In all three countries, electricity prices are more competitive against gas than in most other economies assessed.’
Potential for take off
Germany, India, Italy, Poland and the UK, meanwhile, are described as having ‘potential for take-off’, with suitable enabling conditions in place, but deployment more sluggish.
The UK boasts the largest gap between policy and delivery among the countries in this cohort, while Germany faces a ‘grid connection backlog’ of hundreds of gigawatts, the report notes.
Risk of stalling
The next cohort, described as at ‘risk of stalling’, includes the US, Australia, Brazil, Ethiopia and South Korea – in these countries, deployment is at or above the halfway mark but enabling conditions are below the median.
In the US, this is linked to federal policy changes and grid constraints, with the report noting that over 2TW of generation and storage capacity is waiting in interconnection queues, compared with around 1.3TW of existing generating capacity.
Early-stage adopters
Finally, Indonesia, the Philippines and South Africa are classified as ‘early-stage adopters’, with deployment and enabling conditions currently falling below the halfway mark.
Clean energy accounts for less than a fifth (18%) of generation in Indonesia and South Africa, and just under a quarter (23%) in the Philippines, with grid investment also below the global average.
The countries assessed in the report included Australia, Brazil, China, Ethiopia, France, Germany, India, Indonesia, Italy, the Philippines, Poland, South Africa, South Korea, Spain, the UK and the US. Read more here and here.
