Europe halfway to reaching 20 per cent renewable target

Europe is more than halfway to hitting its target of generating 20 per cent of energy from renewable sources by 2020, according to new figures published by Eurostat today.

Renewable energy consumption rose 0.6 per cent in the European Union in 2008 to 10.3 per cent, compared with 9.7 per cent in 2007 and 8.8 per cent in 2006, meaning that the EU has passed the halfway point to reaching its 20 per cent target over the next decade.

Of the EU's three biggest economies – Germany, France and Britain – France boasted the highest share at 11 per cent of gross final energy consumption generated by renewable energy sources, followed by Germany's 8.9 per cent and the UK's 2.2 per cent.

It means the UK is continuing to lag behind its European counterparts and still needs to boost renewable energy consumption by almost 13 percentage points before reaching its 15 per cent target.

France and Germany need to boost their share of renewable energy usage by 12 and 9.9 percentage points respectively to reach their targets of 23 and 18 per cent.

The EU's 2009 directive on renewable energy set individual targets for all 27 member states, with the goal that the EU will reach a 20 per cent share of total energy consumption from renewable sources by 2020. Targets take into consideration member states' different starting points, renewable energy potential and economic performance.

Closest to achieving their targets for share of renewable energy were Romania, followed by Sweden, with rises of 3.6 and 4.6 percentage points needed to reach their respective targets of 24 per cent and 49 per cent of renewable energy consumption in 2020.

In order to boost global climate negotiations, the EU has indicated that it might raise its 2020 renewable energy consumption target to 30 per cent, should other major economies such as the US, China and India agree to binding emissions reduction targets.

Renewable energy sources cover solar, thermal and photovoltaic energy, hydro (including tide, wave and ocean) energy, wind, geothermal energy and biomass (including biological waste and liquid biofuels), according to Eurostat.

The contribution of renewable energy from heat pumps is also covered for the member states for which this information was available. The energy delivered to final consumers – industry, transport, households, services, and so on – from these sources is the nominator of the target.

The highest share of renewable energy in total consumption in 2008 was found in Sweden (44.4 per cent of renewable energy sources in total consumption), Finland (30.5 per cent), Latvia (29.9 per cent), Austria (28.5 per cent) and Portugal (23.2 per cent), and the lowest in Malta (0.2 per cent), Luxembourg (2.1 per cent), the UK (2.2 per cent), the Netherlands (3.2 per cent) and Belgium (3.3 per cent), according to Eurostat data.