Notable trends include the following.
- Global solar investment increased to $161 billion in 2017, up 18% from 2016.
- The cost of utility-scale solar photovoltaic systems continues to fall. They are about 25% cheaper per megawatt (MW) than two years ago.
- China continues to lead in clean energy investment. China invested $133 billion in 2017 (40% of the global clean energy investment total), followed by the U.S. at $57 billion.
- Mexico and Australia invested $6 billion and $9 billion, respectively, achieving all-time clean energy investment records for their countries.
The clean energy investment trends report and press release can be accessed on the BNEF website. Clean energy investment figures include renewable electricity generation systems (wind, solar, biomass, small hydro, geothermal, and marine), biofuels, and energy smart technologies such as digital energy, smart grids, power storage, hydrogen and fuel cells, advanced transportation, and energy efficiency. Hydro projects larger than 50MW and solar projects smaller than 1MW are not included.