It’s a cliché that a picture paints a thousand words, but there’s no denying a well-designed graph can visualise data in ways that sentences rarely can. So look back on 2025, we’ve selected six charts that extract the signal from the noise and show what happened in the world of climate finance (and the world in general).
The last 12 months have been ones of extreme contrasts. Increasing pushback from some quarters on net zero and a retreat from earlier commitments has been challenged by the rapid uptake and falling costs of low-carbon technology. These graphs draw a picture of what transpired in 2025, and hint at what is yet to come.
Global temperatures continue to climb
Global warming is continuing at pace with 2025 set to be either the second or third warmest year on record, according to the World Meteorological Organization (WMO).
Between January and August, mean temperatures were 1.42°C above the pre-industrial average, the WMO said. Concentrations of greenhouse gases also continue to increase, while sea ice keeps melting and sea levels rise.
“It will be virtually impossible to limit global warming to 1.5°C in the next few years without temporarily overshooting this target. But the science is equally clear that it’s still entirely possible and essential to bring temperatures back down to 1.5°C by the end of the century,” said WMO secretary-general Celeste Saulo.
Countries are responding to the crisis by setting up early warning systems for extreme weather: the number of countries with such systems doubled to 119 in 2024 from 56 in 2015, the WMO said. ET
Billion-dollar disasters tick upward in the US
The US experienced 27 individual weather and climate disasters with at least $1bn in damages in 2024, trailing only the record-setting 28 events of 2023, according to an analysis by the National Centers for Environmental Information (NCEI). The disasters included cyclones, tornadoes, flooding, drought, wildfires and other severe weather.
These disasters caused at least 568 direct or indirect deaths, and the total cost was approximately $182.7bn, making 2024 the fourth-costliest on record. Since such records began in 1980, the US has suffered 403 weather and climate disasters for which the individual damage costs reached or exceeded $1bn, with the cumulative cost exceeding $2.915tn.
However, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration announced in May that the NCEI will stop tracking the cost of extreme weather and climate disasters, as President Donald Trump cuts funding for climate-related programmes. Local governments had used the database for budgeting and resource allocation, grant applications for federal aid, and planning and risk mitigation, climate advocates told a reporter from Utility Dive.
In the EU, weather- and climate-related extremes caused losses of an estimated €822bn between 1980 and 2024, with the last four years accounting for four of the top five losses, according to the European Environment Agency. It also predicted that losses are set to increase as extreme events are expected to intensify further. ET
Fossil fuel financing bounces back
Investment by global banks in fossil fuels jumped again in 2024, after a steady decline in the previous few years, according to a report from the Banking on Climate Chaos coalition of campaign and research organisations.
The world’s 65 biggest banks committed US$869bn to companies active in fossil fuels in 2024, a big jump from $707bn in 2023, with banks like JP Morgan Chase, Citigroup and Bank of America leading “the dirty dozen”.
“Despite adopting policies in previous years on ‘net zero’ and other climate commitments, in 2024 global banks walked back many of those climate pledges and significantly increased their fossil fuel financing, including ramping up finance for fossil fuel expansion,” the report said.
“It is vital for policymakers to put regulatory muscle behind their Paris Agreement commitments and hold financial institutions accountable to protect our climate, our communities, and our economies from the harms of fossil fuel finance.” ET
Investment in clean energy transition outweighs fossil fuels
Despite the increase in fossil fuel financing, global investment in clean energy has increased. This has come about even as the US has pushed for more investments in fossil fuels and Trump has cancelled low-carbon projects.
According to the IEA’s World Energy Investment report, about twice as much was invested in renewables, nuclear, storage, low-emission fuels and electrification, compared to oil, natural gas and coal. Meanwhile, the International Renewable Energy Agency (Irena) reported that global renewable energy investment hit $807bn in 2024.
Much of that investment was spearheaded by China, although it also invested the most in fossil fuels.
But even with the increase in renewables, it might not be enough to reach 2030 targets, experts warn.
“Funding for renewables is soaring but remains highly concentrated in the most advanced economies … scaling finance for emerging and developing countries is essential to make the transition truly inclusive and global,” said Francesco La Camera, director-general of Irena. MC
Deployment of clean energy technology accelerates
The rate of energy technology deployment has accelerated since 2010, with electric vehicles taking off in 2020, according to the International Energy Agency (IEA).
Although solar continues to hold the largest share, wind and other low-emission technologies have also increased their share of power generation capacity. The EU, for example, hit its 2025 solar target, while in the US more than 75% of the country’s new power generation capacity was solar.
Energy technologies have had substantial cost reductions and performance improvements in recent years, helping the average global price of renewables like solar and EV to fall, the report found.
While there has been turbulence in the energy sector in the last few years due to geopolitical tensions, “demand for energy services is rising as the global economy grows and the world’s population increases, and electricity is playing an increasingly important role in meeting rising demand,” the IEA said in its annual World Energy Outlook report. MC
China’s emissions growth grinds to a halt
China’s emissions have been flat or on the decline since March 2024, largely thanks to the adoption of electric vehicles, according to an analysis from Carbon Brief.
CO2 emissions from transport fell by 5% and there have been declines in cement and steel production emissions.
The country’s capacity for solar and wind has also risen, putting it on track to meet a new renewable record. The scale of its renewable energy is unprecedented, as it added nearly as much wind and solar between 2021 and 2024 as the rest of the world combined, says Muyi Yang, an analyst at Ember.
“China’s energy transition is evolving beyond simply adding clean megawatts. It is becoming a structural shift – the construction of a clean mega-system able to sustain renewables at scale, ensure supply reliability, and push clean electricity deeper into the broader economy,” he wrote in Le Monde.
While there has been a decline in emissions and progress on financing low-carbon projects in China, those gains have been offset by surge in CO2 from the chemical and plastic production industries. MC
This page was last updated December 18, 2025