1) 2014 saw declines in oil prices but gains for solar power as it started to have a significant impact on global energy markets. 2) Offshore wind and wave power projects in the US and Europe have faced delays, with Europe far exceeding the US in installed offshore wind capacity. 3) Solar power installation grew rapidly in the US and broke records in other countries like Germany and the UK, representing over a third of new electricity capacity added in the US.

1. INSTITUTO TECNOLOGICO DE TUXTEPEC
DIPLOMADO DE INGLES LEVEL 4
2014 Renewable Energy Recap:
Oil Down, Solar Up
If we want to stay positive, 2014 was the year when solar power started making the sort
of noise in global energy markets that experts have long predicted. If we allow some
cynicism to creep in, 2014 was a year when big ideas stalled out, when falling oil prices
left renewable energy’s immediate future in limbo, and when international climate deals
seem both hopeful and far too timid.
Let’s start with the empty side. As has become tradition in these year-end posts, a quick
look at the U.S. offshore wind industry: nope, still nothing.
The miniature test turbine up in Maine remains the lone offshore turbine; the big
projects gunning for the real first-in-water prize, meanwhile, do seem to be getting close.
Star-crossed Cape Wind is finally through its legal and permitting hurdles, has made
financing progress including $150 million from the Department of Energy, and plans to
start construction in 2015; Deepwater Wind’s Block Island Wind Farm is also on track,
with permitting completed and steps like naming its turbine foundation fabricator.
Progress, perhaps, until we look at Europe and it’s 7000-plus megawatts of installed
offshore capacity.
Another branch of marine-based renewable energy had a particularly disappointing year:
wave power, long hyped as a great untapped source, seems to be taking steps backward
all the time.

2. INSTITUTO TECNOLOGICO DE TUXTEPEC
DIPLOMADO DE INGLES LEVEL 4
Ocean Power Technologies, among the theoretical leaders in developing viable wave
power tech, has scaled back or cancelled several plans this year, and the world still has
no grid-connected wave power at all.
In fact, we don’t even really know what wave energy should look like; designs abound,
and research continues, but even a few megawatts of wave energy by decade’s end
would be impressive.
Moving to the full part of the glass, solar power is really starting to explode. In the U.S.,
a big third quarter brought the country up to 16.1 gigawatts of installed photovoltaic
capacity, with another 1.4 GW of concentrating solar power.
According to the Solar Energy Industries Association, the growth through three quarters
represented 36 percent of all new electricity capacity; in 2012, solar represented only 9.6
percent of new growth.
Around the world as well, solar made headlines this year. Germany produced half of its
electricity from solar power on one particularly sunny day in June, and even the gloomy
weather of the United Kingdom set records.