The World Energy Outlook triggered the usual memes on the "The IEA biased for fossil fuels" or "systematically wrong on solar", my reflections.

Starting with setting the record straight. The first time an IEA Executive Director publicly warned about the impact of fossil fuel use on the climate was 1978. Since then we have contributed to every single COP, became a lead facilitator to Sustainable Energy for All, consistently advocated for a stronger climate policy and accelerated renewable deployment and worked with some of the most ambitious national decarbonization plans. The idea of the IEA intentionally hindering the transition is right out there with accusing NASA of hiding aliens in Area 51. We are happy to have a debate but let’s maintain certain professional standards.

With that out of the way, let's move to the debate, starting with a request. Would you mind reading if not the entire WEO but at least the executive summary before tweeting about it. Year after year we clearly state that the projections based on the policies being implemented. For example in 2008 China introduced a national solar target for 2020 at 1.8 GW. This was revised four occasions by various party congresses and government decisions, by 2020 it will be overachieved by a factor of 100. China's policy changes represent around half of the total global revisions on solar that everyone is so excited about. The potential for much faster growth was clearly identified, Solar Energy Perspectives which mapped a pathway for solar supplying half of total global energy was published in 2011. However, the WEO’s role is not to speculate on what decisions the next party congress might take. Similarly there have been major policy changes shaping the solar trajectory in India and Japan as well and those were incorporated into the WEO once the respective governments announced them. Take Africa which currently has 1% of global solar capacity, less than sun scorched Britain. Anyone believes that this is the optimum delivered by the free market or perhaps it is a result of current policy failures regarding financing and infrastructure which will need to be corrected?

Be careful with the exponential function. Doubling something from 100 GW in the physical world is different from doubling it from 1. A possible slowdown in the growth of renewables is unfortunately not a mathematical absurdity. Solar deployment in China currently is around half the speed of the 2017 level, an acceleration way beyond that is certainly possible, hopefully likely but will require policy action. Similarly, global wind deployment had stagnated for 3 years from 2015 despite declining costs and an ample potential. As renewables mature, a higher and higher deployment will be needed for a given capacity growth due to the need for replacing old solar panels and wind turbines, they are made from silicon and steel, not diamonds. Financing, grid access and electricity market design issues will need to be overcome to maintain acceleration.

The warnings of the World Energy Outlook about the insufficient speed of clean energy deployment are similar to a sport trainer saying that “if you maintain this lifestyle, you will collapse before half of the marathon”. You lose weight, step up your training and improve beyond his original assessment, good. However, the well below 2 degrees will be the equivalent of keeping up with the Ethiopian Olympics team. Yelling at the trainer for telling you that this is still not good enough does not help.