Enabling the Private Sector to Accelerate Renewable Energy Deployment
On 14 January, during the first day of the IRENA Assembly, a plenary session brought together governments and corporate buyers of renewable energy to discuss how to further enable the private sector to accelerate renewable energy deployment through corporate sourcing.
Mr. Henning Wuester, Director of IRENA’s Knowledge, Policy and Finance Centre, presented the Secretariat’s recent work on corporate sourcing of renewables developed in collaboration with the IRENA Coalition for Action and the Clean Energy Ministerial (CEM). He outlined how corporations are increasingly becoming important renewable energy investors, with for example 40% of Fortune 500 companies making renewable energy commitments and over 80 leading corporations aiming for 100% renewables as part of the RE100 initiative. The presentation closed with the launch of the IRENA corporate sourcing video featuring some of the largest corporate buyers of renewable energy today.
The panel discussion, moderated by H.E. Dr. Ibrahim Saif, Jordan’s Minister of Energy and Mineral Resources, gathered H.E. Tone Skogen, Norway’s State Secretary, and Mr. Thorsten Herdan, Director General for Energy Policy, at Germany’s Federal Ministry of Economics and Technology (BMWi), from the government side, and Mr. Roger Gonzalez Lau, Vice-President Energy, CEMEX and Mr. Ibrahim Al Zubi, Head of Sustainability, Majid Al Futtaim from the corporate buyers’ side. The discussion focused on the main drivers for companies to source renewable electricity and highlighted long-term electricity prices as well as environmental and branding concerns as the most prominent drivers. In terms of enabling frameworks, the panellists emphasized the governments’ role to prevent market distortion and enable various options for the sourcing of renewables, including third-party sourcing, direct investments, and the purchasing of renewable energy certificates.
In the plenary discussion that followed, a number of IRENA member states provided their perspectives on what the private sector and governments should do to spur corporate sourcing of renewables. While emphasizing the need to shed further light on enabling and market design to drive corporate sourcing forward, several delegations acknowledged IRENA’s ongoing work on the REmade Index and referred to IRENA as an important knowledge partner for the CEM Corporate Sourcing of Renewables Campaign.
In addition to the above proceedings, IRENA encouraged its Member to partake in IRENA’s country survey on enabling frameworks for corporate sourcing. The results of the survey will feed into IRENA’s work on the REmade Index.
For more information about IRENA’s work on corporate sourcing of renewables, please contact sweckend@irena.org or coalition@irena.org.
Introductory remarks and moderation
H.E. Dr. Ibrahim Saif, Minister of Energy and Mineral Resources, Jordan
Presentation on Corporate Sourcing of Renewables
Mr. Henning Wuester, Director of Knowledge, Policy and Finance Centre, IRENA
Panellists:
H.E. Tone Skogen, State Secretary, Norway
Mr. Thorsten Herdan, Director General for Energy Policy, Federal Ministry of Economics and Technology (BMWi), Germany
Mr. Roger Gonzalez Lau, Vice-President Energy, CEMEX
Mr. Ibrahim Al Zubi, Head of Sustainability, Majid Al Futtaim