José Manuel Entrecanales, chairman and CEO of ACCIONA, stated today that "it is worrying that the US, Europe, and other advanced economies only installed 20% of the world’s new renewable energy capacity in 2023," when their share of the global Gross Domestic Product (GDP) exceeds 50%.

In a panel discussion during the International Renewable Energy Agency’s (IRENA) 14th Assembly, the chairman of ACCIONA said that "the major market economies are losing ground" in the global process of decarbonizing the economy. Last year, "China produced 70% of the world's installed capacity, when it represents only 17% of the world’s GDP,” he added.

According to José Manuel Entrecanales, this imbalance is due to the fact that "the main element for attraction of capital, which is key to developing renewable energy, is not working as well as it should. We tend to forget that the overwhelming element that moves private capital is the risk-reward equation. This needs to be enhanced to match the excellent performance of China in this industry."

Mr. Entrecanales spoke during a panel discussion at IRENA’s assembly in Abu Dhabi alongside Luc Remont, CEO of EDF; Julia Souder, chair of the Global Renewables Alliance; Dany Qian, vice-president of Jinko Solar Global, and Habiba Ali, CEO of Sosai Energies.

At the panel, ACCIONA’s chairman highlighted that there are challenges to renewable energy development in all regions of the world. “Europe faces regulatory, transmission, network and pricing problems. Africa has scale and financing problems, while Latin America suffers from political problems.” He went on to say that “currently, the US has done a very good job with the IRA [Inflation Reduction Act].”