India, IRENA inks pact to bolster its renewable energy partnership

India’s Ministry of New and Renewable Energy (MNRE) has inked a strategic partnership agreement with International Renewable Energy Agency (IRENA), indicating its purpose to further boost its association with IRENA in the field of renewable energy. The pact was inked during the 12th IRENA Assembly by the Ministry of New and Renewable Energy (MNRE) Secretary, Indu Shekhar Chaturvedi and IRENA Director-General Francesco La Camera. India established 13 gigawatts (GW) of renewables in 2021 and has increased its capacity by more than 53 GW in the past five years, placing it as one of the fastest developing renewable energy adopters in the world. With enormous renewable energy potential, India has a goal to become a significant generator of green hydrogen to help the decarbonisation of its industrial economy. As per IRENA, hydrogen will account for about 12% of the total energy supply in a 1.5°C world by 2050. Francesco La Camera IRENA Director-General told the media that India is a renewable energy powerhouse and a nation whose energy change actions speak louder than their words. As a fundamental global actor in the transition to renewables and a founding member of IRENA, India has played a significant role in international energy cooperation. The partnership denotes a new chapter in an already strong association as the country plans to advance its shift and capitalise on emerging new technologies. Under the collaboration, IRENA will encourage knowledge sharing from India on increasing renewable energy and clean energy technologies and help India’s efforts to advance cost-effective decarbonisation via the development of domestic green hydrogen. The two will work closely to evaluate the potential role green hydrogen can play both, as an enabler of the shift in India and as a new source of national energy exports. India has started the process of building and rolling out a National Green Hydrogen Mission to enable cost-competitive green hydrogen production, distribution, storage, and application technologies. Image Source Also read: IREDA rolls out a new program to boost green mobility Also read: BPCL and BARC unite to scale up tech for Green Hydrogen production