The new year kicked off for the Global Solar Council with a series of events and meetings in Abu Dhabi that saw important steps taken in building partnerships geared towards presenting a coordinated and united voice in favor of solar and other renewable technologies.
The IRENA Assembly and the World Future Energy Summit in Abu Dhabi presented the occasion to hold the first GSC board meeting of 2020, which set out the organization’s plan for the year built around three main pillars: education, both in terms of a proper understanding at all levels of government about the right policy support for solar growth and in terms of the role a better informed public can play in stimulating politicians to make the climate emergency a top priority; partnerships to replace the barriers that often exist between public institutions and the private sector, even within green industry sectors, and to reinforce our advocacy actions; and innovation through collaboration across clean-tech industries to find synergies and develop circular economy solutions.
The focus of GSC’s work in 2020 will be to consolidate our existing partnerships, build new alliances with like-minded organizations and to take a strong message to the COP26 at the end of the year.
The Abu Dhabi events were already an important opportunity to reinforce the Global Solar Council’s partnership with the International Renewable Energy Agency (IRENA):
- GSC Chair Gianni Chianetta was elected as one of the eight members of the steering committee of IRENA’s Coalition for Action, which brings together 95 leading renewable energy players (private sector companies, industry associations, civil society, research institutes and intergovernmental organizations) to promote the wider and faster uptake of renewable energy technologies; he also addressed the Public-Private Dialogue during IRENA’s 10th Assembly, which brought together 1,500 delegates;
- Adrian Whiteman and Xavier Casals of IRENA presented to an open session of the GSC board meeting, providing insights into the global solar market and power system structures respectively, and discussed how the two organizations can collaborate on tracking market trends and monitoring policy tools;
- GSC Chair Gianni Chianetta also had a one-on-one meeting with IRENA’s Director-General Francesco La Camera to talk about developing joint reports and wider engagement efforts such as webinars, workshops and events.
Download Irena’s presentations:
– Power system organizational structures for the Renewable Energy era
– Renewable Energy Statistics