IRENA at BETD 2022

IRENA strongly engaged at the 8^th annual Berlin Energy Transition Dialogue, hosted and supported by the German Federal Government and a joint initiative of German Renewable Energy Federation (BEE), German Solar Association (BSW-Solar), German Energy Agency (dena) and Eclareon.

The event took place on 29 and 30 March 2022, at the Berlin headquarters of the Federal Foreign Office. Under the motto “From Ambition to Action”, the BETD provides an opportunity for an international public and private audience to come together with high-level policymakers and experts to discuss viable actions to be taken for the ongoing global transformation of the energy sector.

During BETD, IRENA launched the 2022 edition of “World Energy Transitions Outlook”. The World Energy Transitions Outlook outlines a pathway for the world to achieve the Paris Agreement goals and halt the pace of climate change by transforming the global energy landscape. This report presents options to limit global temperature rise to 1.5°C and bring CO₂ emissions to net zero by 2050, offering high-level insights on technology choices, investment needs, policy framework and the socio-economic impacts of achieving a sustainable, resilient and inclusive energy future.

IRENA’s participation in the BETD agenda:

• “On the Green Sofa”, 29 March: IRENA’s Director-General, Francesco La Camera attended the “green sofa” chat to discuss the current state of the energy transition and shared views on their latest analysis on trends in renewables globally.
• “Hydrogen Diplomacy – Resetting Global Energy Relations?”, 29 March: IRENA Deputy Director General Gauri Singh participated in a panel discussion answering imperative questions on the important role hydrogen will have to play in reaching net zero carbon emissions by the middle of the century.
• “Skill development in the energy transition”, 30 March: IRENA Director of Knowledge, Policy and Finance Centre, Dr. Rabia Ferroukhi, partook in a session to discuss how countries can fill that gap of skilled workers during the energy transition and how specialists must be trained to be capable of acting competently in all the important areas of application.

For more information about BETD, please visit the official website.

BETD 2022 Side Event - 28 March 2022:

Insights from Net-zero LTES for National Energy Planning

The importance of long-term energy scenarios (LTES) as a tool to support policy makers is ever increasing in the face of the clean energy transition. Energy scenarios produced are varied, leading to an abundance of insights and technology combinations. LTES have also been featured prominently in the political sphere as pathways to national and global net-zero targets. It has therefore become crucial to compare different scenarios produced by a variety of global organizations, in order to formulate the correct policies for the transition, channel investments and inform the public about how to visualize the pathways and objectives for a clean and sustainable future.

In the past years, the concept of net-zero has also prominently featured on the global agenda, as countries continue to agree that the targets set forth by the Paris Agreement cannot be reached without large-scale and urgent decarbonisation of our energy systems. Scenarios have been modelled by government institutions to showcase the different pathways towards those targets, with varying mixes of technologies, policies, business models and transition speeds. A clear overview of these scenarios is highly necessary to ensure the right messaging for decisionmakers to formulate national energy plans and roadmaps.

Benchmarking net-zero scenarios have showcased overarching trends that are common in decarbonisation pathways, such as end-use sector electrification, energy efficiency improvements and high shares of renewable energy. However, it is important to delve further into the enabling factors for such trends. Digitalisation, decentralisation and behavioural changes are some of the key factors in enabling the energy transition, but have net-zero scenarios begun to showcase these elements, and are governments actively including such enabling factors in their long-term planning?

This event brought together experts to explore how this plethora of net-zero LTES can be analysed and compared to produce useful insights for ambitious policymaking, through addressing some other key questions:

• What are the key elements that constitute net-zero LTES and how can they be incorporated for national planning purposes?
• In devising net-zero scenarios, what are the key methodological challenges? What lessons can we learn for national net-zero scenario development?

The event also featured insights gained from IRENA’s National Energy Transition Planning Dashboard, which showcases information and highlights of national energy plans around the world and discusses how governments can benefit from such insights in formulating ambitious, transformative and just plans for their own countries. This initiative alongside insights gained from the Clean Energy Ministerial LTES Initiative can provide highly effective mapping methodologies and tools for governments to achieve net-zero. 

The concept note can be found here.

Agenda: