Global renewable energy capacity increased 7.5% year-on-year in 2019, led by growth from solar and wind sources, according to the International Renewable Energy Agency (IRENA).

Data published by the agency last week showed that global installations of renewables capacity totalled 2.53 gigawatts (GW) in 2019, up from 2.35 GW in the previous year, Kallanish Energy reports.

Solar energy recorded the highest y-o-y increase at 20.2%, with total new capacity reaching 584,842 megawatts (MW) last year. Installations totaled 486,721 MW in 2018.

Total wind capacity grew 10.5% y-o-y, from 563,186 MW in 2018 to 622,408 MW in 2019.

The majority of new wind capacity came from onshore turbines, which contributed 594,253 MW to last year’s total wind installations. Onshore saw an increase of 10.1% y-o-y from the 539,557 MW capacity deployed in 2018.

In terms of growth, offshore wind recorded a 19.5% y-o-y increase to reach 28,115 MW in 2019, from 23,629 MW a year earlier.

Meanwhile, total global hydropower capacity rose 1% to 1.30 GW in 2019 from 1.29 GW in 2018. New bioenergy capacity recorded a 5.4% y-o-y increase, growing to 124,026 MW from 117,738 MW.

In terms of global regions, Asia again recorded the highest level of new renewables capacity at 1.11 GW 2019 — a 9.3% y-o-y increase.

The largest annual increase was recorded in the Oceania region at 19.7%, where capacity grew to 37,149 MW in 2019 from 30,989 MW the previous year. The Middle East region also recorded a substantial yearly capacity growth of 13.2% to reach 23,137 MW.

Europe and North America saw total capacity increases of 6.7% and 5.7%, respectively, while there was also marginal growth in Africa (4.3%), Eurasia (3%) and South America (3.8%).

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