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WASHINGTON — The world’s leading energy agency said on Tuesday that clean energy technologies such as wind turbines, solar panels and electric vehicles are advancing so quickly that global fossil fuel use is expected to peak in the mid-2020s and then decline.

But there’s a catch: The shift from coal, oil and gas is still not fast enough to avoid dangerous levels of global warming, at least unless governments take much stronger action to reduce their planet-warming carbon, the agency said. dioxide emissions over the next few years.

International Energy Agency’s annual World Energy OutlookA 386-page report that forecasts global energy trends by 2050 comes just weeks before world leaders meet for a major United Nations climate summit in Glasgow to discuss how to accelerate the move away from fossil fuels and prevent the planet from overheating.

“The world has made remarkable progress on clean energy in the last decade,” said Fatih Birol, the agency’s executive director, in an interview. “But there’s still a lot to be done.”

The new report reveals that the world has taken important steps in the fight against climate change. Wind and solar power is currently the cheapest new source of electricity in most markets and is growing rapidly. Electric vehicle sales worldwide broke records last year. Across the world, approvals for new coal-fired power plants, one of the main sources of emissions, have slowed significantly in recent years as governments and banks increasingly refuse to finance them.

Governments are also accelerating their policies to reduce emissions. The European Union is increasing the price it charges major polluters for their carbon dioxide emissions. India has raised efficiency standards for new air conditioners. China has said it will stop financing new coal plants overseas.

As a result, the International Energy Agency now estimates that humanity’s carbon dioxide emissions will peak in the mid-2020s and gradually decline in subsequent years. Global coal use is expected to decline by 2050. Industrial activity in ChinaGlobal oil demand is expected to decline permanently as people switch to electricity to fuel their cars in the 2030s.

That alone would be a remarkable change. Since the Second World War, global carbon dioxide emissions have been on a seemingly relentless upward trajectory, with only temporary drops during the recession, as the world needs more and more fossil fuels to power homes, cars and factories. According to the report, a turning point is now seen.

The agency warned, however, that this shift is not imminent enough to avert some of the most dangerous consequences of climate change.

Current energy policies will ensure the world continues to warm by about 2.6 degrees Celsius (4.7 degrees Fahrenheit) by 2100, the report said. United Nations last month. warned Noting that such an outcome would be “catastrophic”, he points out that countries are exposed to a much higher risk of deadly heat waves, droughts, floods and forest fires after only 1.1 degrees Celsius of global warming to date.

Many world leaders hope to limit average global warming to around 1.5 degrees Celsius to prevent some of the most dire and irreversible risks from climate change, such as widespread crop shortages or ecosystem collapse.

To achieve this goal, global emissions simply won’t be enough for them to peak and then slowly decline over the next decades, as they are now on track, the International Energy Agency said. Instead, the world’s nations will need to act much faster to reduce emissions for nearly half of this decade and stop adding carbon dioxide to the atmosphere altogether by 2050.

Earlier this year, the agency determined a detailed roadmap What might such an effort look like? For example, by 2030, electric vehicles will need to account for more than half of global new car sales, which is just 5 percent today. By 2035, rich countries would have to shut down nearly all fossil fuel power plants in favor of cleaner technologies like wind, solar or nuclear power. By 2040, all the world’s remaining coal plants will need to be retired or equipped with technology to capture and bury their carbon emissions.

The agency said countries must triple their investment in clean energy over the next decade, to around $4 trillion a year. Much of this increased spending will have to flow to developing countries, which have been responsible for much of the increase in emissions in recent years but have struggled to access finance.

“Until now, only 20 percent of clean energy investments go to developing countries,” Birol said. “This needs to change. This is a race that no one can win until everyone finishes the race.”

Many countries are contemplating stronger action, at least on paper, the report said. China and more than 50 countries, including the United States and the European Union, have now announced goals to reach “net zero,” that is, to reach the point where they no longer add carbon dioxide to the atmosphere. the next few decades.

If every country fulfills this promise, the world could potentially limit total global warming to around 2.1 degrees Celsius by 2100, according to the report. But even this outcome is far from certain, as most nations that have pledged to go to net zero have yet to enact policies to achieve these goals.

The new report also warns that the transition to a cleaner energy economy can have ups and downs without careful planning. Global investment in new oil and gas development has dwindled over the past six years, especially after the pandemic. However, if the world does not invest enough in clean energy alternatives to replace these resources, many countries such as Europe may find themselves in an energy crisis. is happening now this autumn.

“This needs to happen as soon as possible, or the global energy markets will face a turbulent and volatile period,” the report said.