23 percent of energy consumption comes from renewable sources

© ANP / Berlinda van Dam
  • Of the energy consumption from renewable sources, 34 percent comes from biomass and 23 percent from solar energy.
  • 32 percent of energy consumption in buildings comes from renewable sources. In manufacturing, this share is 8 percent.
  • The Netherlands has seen the largest increase in the share of renewable energy of any EU country over the past five years.

In 2025, the Netherlands obtained 22.7 percent of its gross final energy consumption from renewable sources, such as wind, solar and biomass, including plant and animal residues. In 2024, this share was 20.2 percent. Renewable energy consumption amounted to 401 petajoules (PJ), a year-on-year increase of 11 percent. The increase was mainly due to sunny weather and a rise in the consumption of bio-kerosene. Gross final energy consumption fell to 1,767 PJ. This is according to provisional figures from Statistics Netherlands (CBS).

More biofuels

Just over one-third (34 percent) of renewable energy comes from biomass, totalling 137 petajoules (PJ). One petajoule is equivalent to the energy needed to heat approximately 26 thousand homes. In 2025, 13 percent more energy from biomass was consumed than in in 2024. This was mainly due to the increased use of biofuels for transport.

In 2025, 33 PJ of energy from biodiesel was consumed, a year-on-year increase of 11 percent. Energy consumption from biokerosene rose to 14 PJ, almost one and a half times as much as in 2024. Energy consumption from bio-petrol was almost the same as in 2024 (11 PJ).

Few new wind turbines

In 2025, energy consumption from wind increased by 4 percent to 121 PJ relative to 2024. This increase is smaller than it was in recent years. Few new wind turbines were commissioned in 2025.

Onshore wind energy production has increased by 1 percent, while offshore production rose by 7 percent. This is because the wind turbines that were first commissioned in 2024 completed their first full year of operation in 2025.

23 percent of renewable energy comes from solar energy

In 2025, 93 PJ of solar power was generated, 19 percent more than in 2024. This was mainly because there was plenty of sunshine. In addition, more solar panels were installed. As a result, installed capacity – the maximum amount of power generated by a solar system – increased by 5 percent.

Increasing amounts of renewable energy from heat pumps
The contribution of heat pumps continues to rise. In 2024, 34 PJ of heat was extracted from the air and the ground using heat pumps, a 9 percent increase in the total amount of renewable energy.

High use of renewable energy in buildings, low in manufacturing

The use of renewable energy varies greatly across the different sectors. This is partly due to the type of energy used in each sector. To encourage the use of renewable energy, sector-specific targets have been agreed upon at European level.

Buildings (residential and the service sector) consumed 597 PJ of energy, 32 percent of which came from renewable sources. The 2030 target for this sector is at least 49 percent. Renewable electricity accounts for the largest share of renewable energy consumption, with around one-fifth coming from on-site generation, such as solar energy from rooftop solar panels.

The manufacturing sector is an energy-intensive sector. In 2025, this sector consumed 1,036 PJ of energy, 419 PJ of which was used as feedstock (for example, oil for the production of plastics), and 87 PJ was from renewable sources (8 percent). The 2023 target for this sector is at least 19.7 percent. 0.2 PJ of renewable energy was used as a raw material. Replacing energy used as a raw material with renewable alternatives such as biomass or renewable hydrogen is more complicated, because in most cases this requires an adjustment to the production process.

The share of renewable energy in the Netherlands has increased by the most since 2019

The share of renewable energy in the Netherlands has increased by the most of any EU member state over the past five years, by 127 percent. In 2024, the Netherlands ranked eighteenth among the EU-27 with 20.2 percent, up from twenty-fifth place in 2019. Sweden has the highest share of renewable energy at 62.8 percent, and Belgium the lowest at 14.3 percent.

By 2030, at least 42.5 percent of energy used in the EU should come from renewable sources. To achieve this collective goal, a specific target has been set for each country. For the Netherlands, the target is 39 percent.

Sources

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