Over 30% of the world’s electricity is now generated from renewable sources – and it’s increasing. (source)

Renewable sources include solar power, wind, hydro-electric, geothermal and – controversially – bioenergy (aka biomass or biofuel – mostly burning of wood pellets).

Why is it controversial? Because of differing definitions of ‘renewable’. In the technical definition, ‘renewable’ is any energy collected from resources that are naturally replenished on a human timescale. In the popular definition ‘renewable’ is equated with ‘sustainable’ and ‘eco-friendly’. Most renewables are sustainable, but some are not. A technically renewable source like biomass (wood pellets), for example, emits air pollution when incinerated and requires large amounts of water and land to produce.

Energy vs Electricity Generation When perusing stats on this topic, note the difference between renewable energy production and renewable electricity production. Energy production & consumption refers to a country’s total economic activity: creation of fuels, powering of industry, transportation and the generation of electricity (a subset of ‘energy’).