Good climate news to end the year - world is decarbonizing faster than was expected ten years ago

SOUTH-EAST ASIA (Bloomberg): Planet-warming greenhouse gas emissions kept rising in 2025 and country pledges to cut them are nowhere near where they need to be to avoid catastrophic climate change, but there were silver linings too.

The world is decarbonizing faster than was expected ten years ago and investment into the clean energy transition, including everything from wind and solar to batteries and grids, is expected to have reached a new record of $2.2 trillion globally in 2025, according to research by the Energy and Climate Intelligence Unit, a London non-profit.

"Is this enough to keep us safe? No it clearly isn’t,” said Gareth Redmond-King, international lead at the ECIU. "Is it remarkable progress compared to where we were headed? Clearly it is.”

This was also the year when renewable power capacity reached new highs, batteries became cheaper than ever and an unprecedented level of protection for the high seas became a reality. Artificial intelligence made climate research faster and more efficient, and weather forecasting more precise. And even as the ravages of climate change became more apparent, economies and people were able to access a growing number of instruments to shield themselves.

Here’s a look at these and other investments, innovations and policy changes that went right for climate in 2025:

Clean energy boom

Global investment in clean tech far outpaced what went into polluting industries.