International Solar Alliance to meet in Delhi on Oct 31

The International Solar Alliance (ISA), a grouping of 109 countries aimed at promoting solar energy, will have its next (6^th) assembly in New Delhi from October 31, ISA’s Director-General, Dr Ajay Mathur said today. 

Speaking at a webinar on “G20 to COP28: What lies ahead for India”, organised by Climate Trends, a Delhi-based climate advocacy company, Dr Mathur said that in the current year, the solar sector would receive $380 billion in investments and loans, but 74 per cent of it would go to the OECD (developed) countries and China. Only “3 per cent or less” would go to Africa, which needs solar energy the most, he said. 

Responding to a question by the host, Aarti Khosla, Director, Climate Trends, on what would be discussed at the ISA assembly, Dr Mathur mentioned getting finance to Africa and other developing countries is one of the major agenda points for the ISA assembly. 

He observed that loans given to the solar sector in Africa were safe, with loans going bad being less than 2 per cent. While there could be delayed repayments, but the loans are mostly repaid. Therefore, it is a question of giving confidence to financiers and the way to do it is for global funds to stand guarantee for loans. 

Dr Mathur observed that the UAE, which is the President of COP28 climate talks slated to happen in Dubai in December, had pledged to provide Africa $4.5 billion and said, “it would be great if a part of the funds is used for providing guarantees to loans.” 

On the Indian scene, Dr Mathur pointed out that the prices of stored renewable energy had already fallen to levels below those of new coal-based power plants and said that pure economics would ensure that most of the power capacity that would be built in the coming years would be renewable. 

Speaking at the webinar, Ajay Shankar, Distinguished Fellow at The Energy and Resources Institute (TERI), and former Secretary, Department of Industrial Policy and Promotion, Government of India, observed that India was better placed than China to do ‘industrial decarbonisation’ because substantial manufacturing capacity is yet to be built in India, which means India can straightaway build low-carbon manufacturing facilities. 

“We should (therefore) welcome Europe’s Carbon border adjustment mechanism,” he said, adding that India can easily decarbonise ‘hard-to-abate’ industrial sectors (such as steel) at the same pace as the industrialised countries. 

Both Mathur and Shankar said that ‘carbon capture, use and sequestration’ (CCUS) measures had limited use and would only play a marginal role in climate action. 

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