Singapore’s electricity consumption in 2025 remained overwhelmingly dependent on fossil fuels, which supplied about 97% of the total. Gas alone accounted for about 94%. Low-carbon electricity supplied just under 3%, entirely from solar in the reported mix. This leaves substantial scope to expand clean electricity and reduce reliance on fossil fuels, along with their climate and air-pollution impacts.

Is Electricity Growing in Singapore?

Electricity consumption per person is growing, but only modestly: it reached a new record of about 10,500 kWh in 2025, up 83 kWh, or roughly 0.8%, from 2024. Low-carbon electricity generation per person, however, fell sharply to 285 kWh from the previous record of 511 kWh in 2024—a decline of about 44%. The small increase in overall electricity consumption is welcome, but the retreat in clean generation is concerning. Singapore needs stronger low-carbon electricity growth to support electrification and rising demand from AI and other digital services.

Suggestions

Singapore should accelerate solar deployment across rooftops, industrial buildings and reservoirs, while considering nuclear electricity as a complementary source of clean generation. Relevant solar examples include island settings such as Cyprus and the US state of Hawaii, where solar supplies about 23% of electricity, and the US state of California, where it supplies almost a third. For nuclear, Singapore could learn from South Korea, where it generates a quarter of electricity, and the United Arab Emirates, where it supplies a fifth. France demonstrates an even larger contribution, with roughly two-thirds of electricity generated by nuclear. These regions offer useful lessons in scaling solar deployment and developing nuclear expertise, helping Singapore build a much larger low-carbon electricity supply.

History

Singapore’s reported low-carbon electricity history began with modest biofuel increases: 0.1 TWh in 1986 and another 0.1 TWh annually from 2013 through 2015. Biofuels then rose by 1.1 TWh in 2019, declined by 0.1 TWh in 2020 and increased by 0.4 TWh in 2022. Solar’s early progress was gradual, with reported increases of 0.1 TWh in both 2016 and 2018, followed by another 0.1 TWh annually in 2020 and 2021. Growth then accelerated to 0.3 TWh each year from 2022 through 2024 and 0.4 TWh in 2025. This strengthening solar expansion is encouraging, although the separate per-person figures show that overall low-carbon generation still lost ground in 2025.

Electricity Imports and Exports

Balance of Trade