Blog Post 31 March 2025

Earth Day 2025

Environment and sustainability

Earth Day is the world’s biggest environmental campaign. It’s a day that calls for people and world leaders to take action on climate change.

On 22 April every year, people come together to recognise the changes needed to address the climate crisis. These changes need to come from governments and businesses as well as individual people.

For Earth Day 2025, the theme is ‘Our Power, Our Planet’, and the organisation that runs the campaign – EARTHDAY.ORG – wants to tripe the global generation of clean electricity by 2030. This year, the campaign invites everyone around the world to get behind renewable energy.

Why is the focus on renewable energy for Earth Day 2025?

The theme for Earth Day changes each year depending on what the organisation deems to be the most important focus.

This year, Earth Day wants the focus to be on renewable energy because:

The cost of making solar panels has dropped dramatically over the last decade – as much as 93% between 2010 and 2020. This makes them a much more affordable option.
Relying less on fossil fuels reduces air pollution, which lowers the risk of serious illness.
It benefits the economy. Investing in renewable energy technologies could create an estimated 14 million jobs worldwide.
It’s possible. Almost 50 nations worldwide already generate more than half of their electricity from renewable energy sources.

The UK solar rooftop revolution

Increasing solar-generated power is something that the UK is aiming for. In 2024, energy secretary Ed Miliband relaunched the Solar Taskforce to help the UK have clean power by 2030. He also said:

“I want to unleash a UK solar rooftop revolution. We will encourage builders and homeowners in whatever way we can to deliver this win-win technology to millions of addresses in the UK so people can provide their own electricity, cut their bills and at the same time help fight climate change.”

Four ways to get involved in Earth Day 2025

There are several ways to take part in Earth Day 2025 and advocate for renewable energy:

Earth Day highlights

1970: The first Earth Day is held in the United States on 22 April. The campaign is founded by US Senator Gaylord Nelson after he witnessed an oil spill in 1960.

1990: 200 million people in 141 countries take part – environmental issues go global.

2000: 184 countries and hundreds of millions of people demand action on global warming and clean energy.

2010: A Billion Acts of Green and The Canopy Project are launched.

2015: Earth Day is chosen by the United Nations as the day to sign the Paris Agreement on climate change.

2020: The 2020 campaign celebrated 50 years of global climate action, where one billion people around the world got involved.

What’s the connection between Earth Day and Energy Saving Trust?

In 1992, pressure from Earth Day paved the way for the United Nations Earth Summit in Rio de Janeiro, where environmental concerns take centre stage. Part of the UK’s response to this summit was the creation of Energy Saving Trust.

Then in 1994, the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) was ratified following the Rio de Janeiro meeting. This introduced non-binding limits on greenhouse gas emissions.

The 1992 Earth Summit was the first of what became the annual Conference of the Parties (COP). All the countries that signed up to the UNFCCC attended this first COP.

One of the most notable COPs in recent years was COP21 , which was held in in Paris in 2015. Here, a set of ‘rules’ were agreed to tackle climate change, which have become known as the Paris Agreement. These included: