The average share of renewable sources in energy consumption at the EU level reached 23 per cent in 2022, an increase of 1.1 percentage points from 2021.

According to Eurostat, Sweden leads among EU countries, with nearly two-thirds of its energy consumption in 2022 derived from renewable sources, followed by Finland (48 per cent), Latvia (43 per cent) and Denmark (42 per cent). At the other end of the scale, Ireland stands at 13 per cent, just below Malta and Belgium. For comparison, the UK figure stands at just over 20 per cent, which includes a small level of nuclear input, and would place it mid-pack, between Germany and France.

The revised Renewable Energy Directive (RED) has revised upwards the EU’s 2030 renewable energy target from 32 per cent to 42.5 per cent, and therefore, EU countries need to intensify their efforts to collectively comply with the new EU target for 2030. The UK is taking a slightly different route by concentrating on getting to net-zero by 2050.

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