Article

What lights up your Christmas tree?

21 December 2021
Tina Aselmann
Tina Aselmann
Editorial & Investment Content
What lights up your Christmas tree?
New York, USA

It’s Christmas. You’re sitting at home, marvelling at your lit up Christmas tree.

Have you ever wondered where the electricity that adds a magical sparkle to a simple pine tree comes from?

For the best part of the 20th century, electricity was generated by burning fossil fuels such as coal or gas.

The UK was the first country that burned coal to supply energy. And in the late 1980s, coal accounted for 60% of electricity production in the country.

But this has changed.

By 2020, this number had fallen to less than 2%.1 And much of this change was due to an increased awareness of the environmental impact of fossil fuel consumption.

With climate change high on the political agenda, countries all around the globe have set their eyes on renewable energy to supply people’s homes with electricity.

In a few years’ time, it may power those sparkling lights on your Christmas tree.  

Figure 1. Share of electricity supply generated by renewables (%)
Figure 1. Share of electricity supply generated by renewables (%)

Source: BP Statistical Review of World Energy & Ember. Data as of 2019.

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