Progress
On track or target met
On track or target met

Desired direction: Increase

Sub-categories

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Download source data for disaggregations (.csv)

Headline data

Installed renewable energy-generating capacity in developing and developed countries (in watts per capita)
Year Value Units GeoCode
2017 169.5 Watts per capita
2018 171.4 Watts per capita
2015 169.3 Watts per capita
2012 165.9 Watts per capita
2023 218.1 Watts per capita
2014 167.8 Watts per capita
2016 169.3 Watts per capita
2019 173.4 Watts per capita
2022 198.3 Watts per capita
2010 164.7 Watts per capita
2013 167.3 Watts per capita
2020 187.8 Watts per capita
2021 197.6 Watts per capita
2011 164.7 Watts per capita

Geographical Area:

Unit of Measurement:

Footnote:

Methodological sheet of the indicator available for the Autonomous Community of the Basque Country.

Available indicator

Installed renewable energy-generating capacity in developing and developed countries (in watts per capita)
Target

12.a Support developing countries to strengthen their scientific and technological capacity to move towards more sustainable patterns of consumption and production
Goal

12- Ensure sustainable consumption and production patterns
Definition

Installed renewable electricity-generating capacity divided by population
Theoretical formula \[CINSTPC_{renewable}^{t} = \frac{CINST_{renewable}^{t}}{P^{t}} \cdot 100\]

where:

$CINST_{renewable}^{t} =$ installed renewable electricity-generating capacity in year $t$

$P^{t} =$ total population in year $t$
Available disaggregations

Type of renewable technology

Province

County

Municipality
Frequency

Annual
Data last updated 2025/05/08
Metadata last updated 2025/06/18

This section provides more information about the United Nations indicator or the European Union Sustainable Development Indicator, such as its rationale, international results, metadata, and other relevant statistics.

Rationale

The infrastructure and technologies required to supply modern and sustainable energy services cover a wide range of equipment and devices that are used across numerous economic sectors. There is no readily available mechanism to collect, aggregate and measure the contribution of this disparate group of products to the delivery of modern and sustainable energy services.

However, one major part of the energy supply chain that can be readily measured is the infrastructure used to produce electricity.

Renewables are considered a sustainable form of energy supply, as their current use does not usually deplete their availability to be used in the future. The focus of this indicator on electricity reflects the emphasis of the target on modern sources of energy and is particularly relevant for developing countries where the demand for electricity is often high and its availability is constrained.

Furthermore, the focus on renewables reflects the fact that the technologies used to produce renewable electricity are generally modern and more sustainable than non-renewables, particularly in the fastest growing sub-sectors of electricity generation from wind and solar energy.

The division of renewable electricity capacity by population (to produce a measure of Watts per capita) is proposing to scale the capacity data to account for the large variation in needs between countries. It uses population rather than GDP to scale the data, because this is the most basic indicator of the demand for modern and sustainable energy services in a country.

This indicator should also complement indicators 7.1.1 and 7.2.1. With respect to electricity access, it will provide additional information to the proportion of people with electricity access by showing how much infrastructure is available to deliver that access (in terms of the amount of capacity per person). The focus on renewable capacity will also add value to the existing renewables indicator (7.2.1) by showing how much renewable energy is contributing to the need for improved electricity access.

Source: United Nations Statistics Division
Comparability between the available indicator and the UN indicator

The available indicator complies with United Nations metadata.
International results

Installed renewable electricity-generating capacity (watts per capita) EG_EGY_RNEW UNSTATS
Link to UN metadata

Metadata 12-a-1.pdf
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