The International Energy Agency said it expects global electricity demand growth to slow in 2023 due to an ongoing crisis in the energy sector and an economic downturn, but a possible recovery in 2024 means the need for more renewable energy facilities.

Forecasts indicate that the global growth rate of energy consumption will slow to just under 2 percent in 2023, down from 2.3 percent in 2022, which also witnessed a decline from the average of 2.4 percent for the five years prior to the COVID-19 pandemic.

And the agency’s data, which was reported by the (CNBC) economic network today, showed that it expects in 2024 that the rate will rise to 3.3 percent, with the improvement of economic prospects.

The Paris-based agency predicted that renewable energy would cover the expected growth this year and next, and that electricity from renewable sources would exceed a third of the total global electricity supply for the first time next year. However, there is a decline in hydroelectric power, as it fell by about 2 percent in the period from 2020 to 2022 compared to figures between 1990 and 2016, which represent about 240 terawatt hours.

-(Petra)