President of the International Solar Alliance (ISA) Assembly and India's Minister for Power and New and Renewable Energy, RK Singh, has called for the derisking of private investments in renewable energy to speed up the energy transition across the world. Speaking at the sixth session of the International Solar Alliance (ISA) Assembly in New Delhi, he pointed out that the move to raise VGF (viability gap funding) from the existing 10% to 35% is aimed at increasing the flow of investments into renewable energy, particularly solar energy.

While a fund has been set up with components of payment security and insurance to ensure the availability of green finance, solar cold storage and cold chains for vaccines have also been inaugurated. Despite working with over 120 member countries and with most multilateral development banks (MDBs) as partners, Singh pointed out that 733 million people in the world still don't have access to electricity, and it's high time ISA emerged as a force for good. However, he refused to specify country-specific energy transition targets for ISA members, citing the differences in circumstances among several countries, while adding that targets should rather be aspirational.

With the COP 28 conference slated to take place in Dubai in a month, the ISA Assembly's co-president and France's Minister of State for Development, Francophonie, and International Partnerships, Chrysoula Zacharopoulou said that the challenge was to lower the cost and drive investment into solar energy, clarifying that the same solar fund can't be expected to finance projects in the OECD countries as well as Africa.

The four following ISA-funded projects were inaugurated at the assembly:

Solarisation of the parliament building of the Republic of Malawi

Solarisation of two rural health care centres in the Republic of Fiji, with an 8-kW solar PV system and 20-kWh battery storage capacity for each health centre

Installation of 1 solar-powered cold storage of capacity 5 MT for the benefit of agricultural stakeholders at La Digue Island, Republic of Seychelles

Solarisation of the Nawai Junior Secondary School (JSS) in the Republic of Kiribati, with a 7 kW Solar PV rooftop system paired with a 24-kWh BSS

While the ministerial representative from Malawi stressed the need for green and affordable energy as the lack of refrigerators in his country's rural areas was leading to the spoiling of vaccines, the ministerial representative from Zimbabwe said that solar energy currently contributes the lowest in the country's energy mix, and despite its huge scope, a demand deficit is deterring private investment. He pointed out that the country's mineral resources of lithium are very critical for the energy transition.

Director General of the ISA, Dr. Ajay Mathur, said that while the solar industry expects 380 billion dollars of investment this year, payment guarantees and insurance mechanisms are aimed at getting investment, as he pointed out efforts to fund 20 startups in the renewable energy sector in Africa. The ISA is now focusing on the next challenge in the solar energy transition: propagating the use of hydrogen as a fuel where carbon can't be used.

(Edited by : Ajay Vaishnav)

First Published:Oct 31, 2023 7:34 PM IST