Europeans now get 46.4% of their electricity from non-carbon courses, if you include nuclear, which supplies most of the electricity at 28%. In 2009, they cut coal consumption drastically from 2008.
Europeans’ hard coal production dropped 9.2% in 2009 from 2008, and Europe similarly reduced their production of natural gas which in 2009 supplied just 19.3% of electricity, a drop of 10.1% compared with the year before.
To replace the coal they increased the use of renewable energy by 8.3% over 2008 levels to supply 18.4%. Also energy use overall fell by 4.7%. Part of that drop is due to the recession, but also it is a continuation of an ongoing reduction in energy consumption, due to an increase in energy efficiency over the last decade.
“Negawatts” are the low hanging fruit of carbon-free clean energy sources. This refers to the fact that it is easier to not build a power plant because energy use is reduced.
When more individuals produce their own rooftop power, utilities do not have to build centralized power plants.
Energy dependence for Europeans is upon Russia. Both oil and natural gas imports remained high, supplying a third of the energy for Europe, but that dropped 5.7%.
Source: Eurostat
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Dear Sir,
It is of interest to know that EU is generating nearly 46% of its electricity from renewable and nuclear and restricting the fossil fuel energy to 54%
Regards,
P N Chetty