Prospective wind and utility-scale solar pipeline reached almost 5 TW in 2025

The global pipeline for wind and utility-scale solar projects grew by 11% in 2025, reaching 4.9 TW. While China and India lead in construction and prospective capacity, G7 nations show stagnant growth in their pipelines, creating a gap in meeting the COP28 goal to triple renewable energy capacity by 2030.

• The global pipeline for announced and in-progress wind and utility-scale solar projects increased by 11% in 2025, rising from 4.4 terawatts (TW) to 4.9 TW. Utility-scale solar drove this expansion with a 17% growth to over 2.2 TW, while the wind pipeline grew by 7% to 2.7 TW.
• There is a significant gap between current pipelines and the COP28 commitment to triple renewable energy capacity by 2030. Even if all projects planned to start by 2030 were completed, the goal would still be short by 1 TW of wind and 1.6 TW of utility-scale solar. This is compounded by the fact that nearly 40% of planned projects are typically delayed, shelved, or cancelled.
• Clean power growth is heavily concentrated in emerging economies, specifically China. China's prospective wind and utility-scale solar capacity exceeds 1.5 TW, and its combined operating wind and solar capacity surpassed 1.6 TW in 2025. In contrast, the G7's pipeline has remained mostly unchanged at approximately 520 GW since 2023, accounting for only 11% of global prospective additions.
• Distributed solar represents about 42% of all existing and prospective solar capacity globally, but its deployment is highly concentrated. Of the nearly 900 GW of operating distributed solar across 31 countries/areas, the top ten countries represent 90% of the total, with China contributing roughly 489 GW.
• Construction of wind and utility-scale solar is concentrated in China and India, which together host 758 GW of projects currently under construction. China hosts 448 GW, while India has 125 GW under construction as it works toward a 2030 target of 500 GW non-fossil capacity.

APA

Zhang, D. K. M. (2026). Prospective wind and utility-scale solar pipeline reached almost 5 TW in 2025. Global Energy Monitor. https://globalenergymonitor.org/research/global-wind-and-solar-2025-g7-gap

Chicago

Zhang, Diren Kocakuşak, Mengqi. Prospective wind and utility-scale solar pipeline reached almost 5 TW in 2025. Global Energy Monitor, 2026. https://globalenergymonitor.org/research/global-wind-and-solar-2025-g7-gap.

Wikipedia

{{cite report |last1=Zhang |first1=Diren Kocakuşak, Mengqi |title=Prospective wind and utility-scale solar pipeline reached almost 5 TW in 2025 |publisher=Global Energy Monitor |date=28 February 2026 |url=https://globalenergymonitor.org/research/global-wind-and-solar-2025-g7-gap |access-date=17 August 2026 |via=Climate Insights Directory}}

BibTeX

@techreport{zhang2026prospective, author = {Zhang, Diren Kocakuşak, Mengqi}, title = {{Prospective wind and utility-scale solar pipeline reached almost 5 TW in 2025}}, institution = {Global Energy Monitor}, year = {2026}, month = feb, url = {https://globalenergymonitor.org/research/global-wind-and-solar-2025-g7-gap}, urldate = {2026-08-17}, note = {Indexed by Climate Insights Directory} }