IEA: Net Zero Emissions by 2050 - Acting now to limit overshoot

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Please note: this is quoted from a Creative Commons source:

IEA (2025), World Energy Outlook 2025, IEA, Paris https://www.iea.org/reports/world-energy-outlook-2025, Licence: CC BY 4.0 (report); CC BY NC SA 4.0 (Annex A)

S U M M A R Y

• The Paris Agreement set the global goal of limiting warming to well below 2 °C and pursuing efforts to limit it to 1.5 °C. The IEA Net Zero Emissions by 2050 (NZE) Scenario translates the 1.5 °C goal into a global pathway for the energy sector. The updated NZE Scenario presented here takes account of the most recent data and trends. Each country will tailor its own path to net zero emissions. The updated NZE Scenario is based on four central pillars that are widely applicable: clean energy electrification, energy efficiency, low-emissions fuels and methane abatement.


• The installed capacity of renewables increases nearly fourfold from today’s level by 2035 in the NZE Scenario: nuclear and other low-emissions technologies increasingly contribute as electricity demand grows to account for one-third of all energy consumption. Energy efficiency increases by about 4% per year by 2035, double the rate of 2022. Sustainable fuels – including liquid biofuels, biogases, low-emissions hydrogen and hydrogen-based fuels – are widely deployed: their use more than quadruples by 2035 from current levels. Methane emissions are cut by more than 80% by 2035.


• Global energy-related carbon dioxide (CO₂) emissions were 38 gigatonnes (Gt) in 2024. In the NZE Scenario, emissions fall by nearly 55% by 2035 to around 18 Gt. Yet, the increase in long-term global average temperature exceeds 1.5 °C around 2030 and peaks at around 1.65 °C about 2050. The NZE Scenario achieves the COP28 goals of doubling efficiency and tripling renewables capacity by 2030, and it meets the Paris Agreement goal of holding warming well below 2 °C throughout the 21st Century.


• The updated NZE Scenario reflects the fact that exceeding 1.5 °C is now inevitable, and some reliance on technologies to remove CO₂ from the atmosphere is unavoidable to return warming to below 1.5 °C. Such technologies are expensive and unproven at scale: immediate action to reduce emissions can limit the scale of the removals needed. In the NZE Scenario, the global average temperature increase falls back below 1.5 °C by 2100.


• Energy investment in the NZE Scenario increases to around USD 4.8 trillion per year over the next decade, from USD 3.3 trillion today. As these upfront investments are made, savings from lower fuel prices together with efficiency gains mean that households face costs for energy services comparable to those of today through to 2035, and lower still in the longer term. Fuel importers benefit too as import bills are cut by about two-thirds. Electricity takes on a bigger role to meet energy demand, underlining the significance of electricity security, and the need for secure and diversified supply chains for critical minerals and energy technologies.