IRENA Renewable Costing Alliance

The International Renewable Energy Agency (IRENA) has maintained a decade long effort to gather precise, reliable information and data on the rapidly improving cost profile of renewable energy sources and technologies. IRENA Renewable Costing Alliance, a key outcome of this efforts, was officially launched on 19 January 2014 after 6 months of consultation with Member States and business stakeholders.

The launch took place in Abu Dhabi at the fourth annual IRENA Assembly, with eight Member countries – Germany, Italy, New Zealand, Tanzania, the United Arab Emirates, the United States, Uruguay and Zimbabwe – becoming the founding signatories of the Costing Alliance. Several member companies from the renewable energy industry have also joined.

“IRENA’s ground-breaking global analysis of the costs of renewables plays a vital role in supporting the business case for renewables and enables us to make powerful statements about their increasing competitiveness,” remarked Adnan Z. Amin, IRENA Director-General.

“The Costing Alliance will enable us to expand our world-class database on the costs of renewables, allow us to engage more actively with industry and reach new audiences with our clear message that renewables are increasingly the economic choice for new capacity installation,” he added.

IRENA is in discussions with around 50 other organisations to follow up on expressions of interest in joining the Costing Alliance.

If you or your organisation is interested in joining the IRENA Renewable Costing Alliance, more information can be found on this page. To contact us about joining, or for any other queries, please email costs@irena.org.

The IRENA Renewable Costing Alliance works at a technical level on availability, cost and performance data for renewables. To this end, all Alliance members agree to share with IRENA, on a confidential basis, real world project cost and performance data for renewables.

Members of the Alliance share IRENA’s objective of promoting the widespread, increased adoption and sustainable use of all forms of renewable energy. Alliance members recognise that the lack of accurate, transparent and reliable data on the cost and performance of renewable technologies from reliable sources is a significant barrier to their accelerated uptake.

The IRENA Renewables Costing Alliance is a technical working group and members must be able to share real world project data. The Alliance has three tiers of membership, member countries, Alliance members and observers.

• Member countries: Member countries of IRENA, including those in the process of becoming members, can join by nominating a utility, research institution or other organisation that is mandated and capable of providing real world project data to join as an Alliance member.
• Alliance members: Utilities, project developers, research institutions, private companies, etc. who have access to real world renewable project cost and performance data and agree to regularly provide this to IRENA to populate IRENA’s Renewable Cost Database.
• Observers: Any organisation or individual interested in the Alliance and its goals.

The Alliance is based on mutual benefit and no costs are involved in joining. The key benefits for Costing Alliance members are: a close association with IRENA and the opportunity to promote engagement with IRENA through the Costing Alliance brand; a quarterly newsletter updating past, current and future plans for cost analysis at IRENA and related topics; an annual workshop; access to IRENA analysts; and the ability to query the IRENA Renewable Cost Database online in detail for internal use and external communications.

Why is there a need for a Costing Alliance?

The IRENA Renewable Cost Database, despite having over 15 000 entries, contains only a proportion of global renewable power generation projects. Moreover, more and better quality data is needed to analyse emerging policy issues and cost reduction opportunities.

What are the requirements when joining the Costing Alliance?

Members will provide regular updates with data for individual projects. This data will be maintained by IRENA in strictest confidence, and summary data will only be published if it meets standard statistical rules to ensure that individual projects cannot be identified. If your organisation does not have project data, it is possible to join as an Observer.

What are the benefits of joining the Costing Alliance?

Members will be able to make detailed queries to the IRENA Renewable Cost Database (currently spanning 8 000 projects and expected to grow) and will receive a quarterly newsletter including special analysis for Alliance members; be invited to an annual workshop and to review IRENA analysis, publications, and work plans; receive advance (embargoed) copies of IRENA cost analysis reports prior to their release; and be able to promote their engagement with IRENA in their communications and outreach.

Can’t I just view the data without joining the Costing Alliance?

No. The general public will have limited access to the database, while members of the Costing Alliance will be able to make detailed queries to gain invaluable insights into the cost and performance of renewables around the world.