Renewable Energy 2026

Introduction

Renewable energy is the dominant force in new power generation worldwide. Deployment benchmarks are broken year after year, capital is flowing into the sector across a wide range of markets, and the legal and regulatory frameworks that govern it have matured considerably. The net-zero target of decarbonisation by mid-century remains the anchor of energy policy across most major economies, its urgency sharpened further by energy security concerns, the intensifying competition for industrial advantage and the increasingly visible consequences of a warming climate.

This new edition of the Chambers Renewable Energy Global Practice Guide offers a fully updated jurisdiction-by-jurisdiction overview of the laws and regulations shaping the renewable energy landscape worldwide, as well current trends, market developments and future outlooks.

Global Commitments and Policies

International climate governance has entered a new phase of ambition and accountability. The landmark commitment made at the 28th Conference of the Parties (COP28) in Dubai in 2023 – to “transition away from fossil fuels” and to triple global renewable energy capacity by 2030 – continues to reverberate through national energy strategies and regulatory programmes. COP29, held in Baku in November 2024, built upon that platform by advancing the new collective quantified goal on climate finance, with developed nations committing to significantly scaled-up support for the energy transitions of emerging economies. Early preparations for COP30, to be hosted by Brazil in Belém in November 2025, are already generating renewed focus on strengthened nationally determined contributions (NDCs) and binding sectoral targets, particularly for power generation and industry.

The Paris Agreement architecture is maturing. The 2025 NDC submission cycle has seen a significant number of major emitters submit updated, more ambitious targets, with the power sector – and renewable energy specifically – at the centre of nearly every national decarbonisation plan. The question is no longer whether the transition will happen, but how fast, on what legal terms and with what allocation of costs and benefits.

In the EU, the implementation of the revised Renewable Energy Directive (RED III) is now well advanced. Member states are transposing its ambitious 42.5% renewables target for 2030 into national law, with permitting acceleration measures, dedicated renewables go-to areas and streamlined grid connection procedures becoming a focus of regulatory reform across the bloc. The EU’s Net-Zero Industry Act and Critical Raw Materials Act are reshaping supply chain law, imposing new domestic manufacturing benchmarks and adding layers of due diligence to project procurement. The European electricity market reform package, agreed in 2024, is reconfiguring the relationship between long-term contracts, spot markets and consumer protection in ways that practitioners must now navigate daily.

In the United States, the Inflation Reduction Act (IRA) continues to be the primary engine of clean energy investment, having catalysed hundreds of billions of dollars in domestic manufacturing and project development since its enactment. As of 2026, the IRA’s tax credit architecture – spanning investment tax credits, production tax credits and transferability and direct-pay mechanisms – has been tested in practice and refined through Treasury guidance. Geopolitical and domestic political dynamics have introduced fresh uncertainty around specific provisions, and practitioners must remain attentive to the evolving regulatory and legislative environment, including the ongoing development of hydrogen production tax credit rules and the operationalisation of grid siting reform under the Federal Power Act.

In Asia, China’s installed renewable capacity now exceeds all other nations combined, and its continued dominance in solar manufacturing is reshaping global supply chains and trade policy simultaneously. India has emerged as one of the most dynamic markets for large-scale renewable procurement, with ambitious offshore wind targets, a maturing renewables auction framework and a rapidly evolving green hydrogen policy. Japan and South Korea continue to refine their offshore wind legal regimes, having moved through early auction rounds and now grappling with grid integration, community engagement and supply chain localisation requirements.

Decentralised action continues to intensify across all regions. Sub-national governments, cities and Indigenous-led energy initiatives are advancing their own renewable programmes, often ahead of national policy frameworks. These developments are generating novel questions of legal authority, land rights, community benefit sharing and governance that practitioners and regulators must increasingly address.

Innovations and Investments

Global investment in the energy transition exceeded USD700 billion in 2025, according to International Energy Agency estimates, with renewable power generation accounting for the largest share. The economics of solar photovoltaic (PV), onshore wind and battery storage have continued to improve, even as project developers navigate a more complex environment of grid constraints, supply chain pressures and higher-for-longer financing costs in certain markets. The range of technologies attracting meaningful capital has expanded considerably: green hydrogen, floating offshore wind, long-duration energy storage, geothermal, sustainable aviation fuels (SAFs) and agrivoltaics are all attracting meaningful capital.

The legal structures supporting investment have grown correspondingly more sophisticated. Corporate power purchase agreements (PPAs) are now a mainstream instrument across Europe, North America and a growing number of emerging markets, and the legal frameworks governing them – including indexation, curtailment risk allocation, credit support and change-in-law protections – are the subject of intensive negotiation and, increasingly, standardisation efforts. Institutional investors, sovereign wealth funds and infrastructure funds have deepened their commitment to the sector, bringing with them heightened scrutiny of environmental, social and governance (ESG) compliance, supply chain due diligence obligations under instruments such as the EU Corporate Sustainability Due Diligence Directive (CSDDD) and biodiversity impact assessments.

Employment in the renewable energy sector reached approximately 17 million jobs globally in 2025, with continued strong demand for legal, regulatory and compliance expertise. The corporate energy buyer market – led by technology companies, data centre operators, manufacturers and retailers – remains a powerful driver of PPA demand and is increasingly influencing the design of electricity market rules and network tariffs.

Wind Energy

Wind power remains the backbone of utility-scale renewable energy in many of the world’s leading markets. Onshore wind continues to offer the lowest levelised cost of energy in favourable resource locations, though permitting reform remains an unfinished agenda in several jurisdictions where planning timelines still constrain development pipelines.

Offshore wind has undergone a period of significant recalibration. Following the project cancellations and auction failures of 2023–24 – attributable to supply chain inflation, interest rate pressures and, in some markets, inadequate contract-for-difference strike prices – the sector has adapted. Revised auction designs, improved cost-reflective support levels and strengthened port and supply chain infrastructure programmes have restored confidence in key markets including the United Kingdom, Germany, the Netherlands and several US states. In Asia-Pacific, Taiwan, Japan, South Korea and Australia are all progressing substantial offshore wind pipelines with evolving local content, grid connection and maritime law frameworks.

Floating offshore wind has advanced from demonstration to early commercial-scale deployment in parts of Europe and Asia. The regulatory novelty of this technology – spanning maritime law, environmental impact assessment, grid connection regimes and decommissioning obligations – continues to generate new legal questions, and bespoke regulatory frameworks are beginning to emerge.

Tender design across all wind sub-sectors increasingly incorporates non-price criteria, including biodiversity net gain, supply chain sustainability, coexistence with fisheries and other maritime users, and community benefit obligations. Practitioners advising on bid preparation and contract negotiation must engage with this broader matrix of legal obligations alongside traditional commercial terms.

Solar Power

Solar PV remains the fastest-growing electricity generation technology in the world. Global installed capacity surpassed 2.2 terawatts by end-2025, with utility-scale and distributed generation both contributing to an extraordinary expansion that shows no sign of slowing. Module costs have continued to fall, making solar competitive without subsidy across an ever-wider range of markets and use cases.

Ground-mounted utility-scale solar is now subject to increasingly complex permitting environments, particularly with regard to land-use conflict, agricultural land protection, biodiversity net gain requirements and grid connection reform. Agrivoltaics – the co-location of solar panels with agricultural production – is attracting growing policy and investor attention, accompanied by emerging legal frameworks in Europe, Japan and the United States.

Rooftop and distributed solar continues to democratise access to clean energy, with self-consumption regulations, net metering reform, community energy models and peer-to-peer trading frameworks evolving rapidly in many jurisdictions. In emerging markets across Africa, South Asia and Latin America, off-grid and mini-grid solar – increasingly coupled with battery storage – remains a primary vehicle for rural electrification and universal energy access, supported by donor-backed legal frameworks and public–private partnerships.

Other Renewable Technologies

Beyond wind and solar, a broader portfolio of renewable technologies is gaining regulatory maturity and investment momentum.

Green hydrogen is central to long-term decarbonisation strategies for hard-to-abate sectors and is now the subject of comprehensive regulatory frameworks in the EU, the United States, the United Kingdom, Australia, Chile and several Gulf states. The operationalisation of the EU’s delegated acts on renewable hydrogen production criteria, the finalisation of US production tax credit rules under Section 45V and the emergence of international hydrogen trade corridors are defining the legal contours of the nascent global hydrogen market. Certification schemes, infrastructure access rules, blending mandates and import/export frameworks are all active areas of legal development.

Battery and long-duration energy storage has become a sector in its own right. Storage-specific licensing regimes, market participation rules, co-location frameworks, safety standards and revenue stacking regulations have emerged or are emerging in most major electricity markets. The interaction of storage with network charges, balancing markets and capacity mechanisms remains a fertile area of legal and regulatory complexity.

Sustainable heat – including geothermal, biomass and waste heat recovery via district heating networks – is expanding as the building and industrial sectors face decarbonisation pressure. Regulatory frameworks addressing consumer protection, emissions standards, permitting and pricing transparency for heat networks are advancing, particularly in Northern Europe.

Biofuels and SAFs are the subject of escalating regulatory activity. SAF mandates are now in force or imminent in the EU, the UK and several other jurisdictions. Maritime decarbonisation obligations under the IMO’s revised greenhouse gas (GHG) strategy and the EU’s FuelEU Maritime Regulation are creating new demand for green fuels, accompanied by intense legal debate around feedstock certification, life cycle emissions accounting and the risk of greenwashing liability.

Grid Integration and Energy Storage

Transmission infrastructure has become one of the most significant bottlenecks to the energy transition. Interconnection queues stretching years into the future, permitting delays for new lines and substations, and inadequate cross-border interconnection capacity are constraining the deployment of otherwise commercially viable renewable projects. In response, regulators and legislators in the EU, the US, the UK and elsewhere have introduced or are advancing substantial grid reform programmes: accelerated permitting regimes, mandatory queue reform, cost-allocation frameworks for anticipatory network investment, and enhanced mechanisms for offshore hybrid interconnectors and multi-terminal high-voltage direct current (HVDC) systems.

Battery storage installations continued to surge in 2025, with cumulative global capacity reaching new records at both utility scale and behind the meter. Legal frameworks for storage – covering market access, revenue stacking, co-location with generation, grid services, safety and decommissioning – are now an active area of regulatory development in virtually every major jurisdiction.

Smart grid development, demand response and electricity market digitalisation are increasingly entangled with cybersecurity regulation, data governance and consumer privacy law. The EU’s Network and Information Systems Directive (NIS2) and the proposed Cyber Resilience Act are among the instruments redefining the obligations of energy sector operators as digital infrastructure and physical energy infrastructure converge.

Conclusion

As of 2026, the renewable energy transition is a structural economic and legal reality. The convergence of favourable economics, political commitment, technological progress and investor appetite is reshaping power systems on every continent. And yet the pace of change required to meet 2030 milestones and stay on a credible path to net zero by mid-century remains demanding. Permitting backlogs, grid constraints, supply chain dependencies, financing gaps in emerging markets and the persistent challenge of ensuring a just and equitable transition all require sustained legal and regulatory innovation.

For legal practitioners, this edition arrives at a moment of extraordinary professional opportunity and responsibility. The transactions being structured, the regulatory frameworks being designed and the disputes being resolved today will determine the shape of energy systems for decades to come. The quality of legal advice, the ingenuity of contractual frameworks and the rigour of regulatory engagement have never mattered more.

This 2026–27 edition of the Chambers Global Practice Guide aims to equip practitioners, investors and policymakers with the authoritative knowledge required to operate with confidence in one of the most consequential sectors of the global economy.