India-backed International Solar Alliance opens business opportunities for the EU

Submitted by Caroline Guillet on 12 March 2018

The International Solar Alliance first summit in March 2018 opens the path to new cooperation opportunities on solar energy between the EU, India and beyond.

The International Solar Alliance (ISA), gathering more than 121 countries, is a treaty-based intergovernmental organisation which aims at promoting the use of solar energy, to come as a replacement for fossil fuel. The partnership was launched in 2015 by Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi, following the Paris Climate Change Conference. In 2016, the framework agreement opened for signature, in Marrakech, Morocco and 121 countries have joined. In 2017, International Solar Alliance received a legal status as a “treaty body” from the UN, at the Bonn Conference.

This Alliance headquarters are based in New Delhi and are heavily supported by the Indian authorities, who also conceive this alliance as a way to promote and export Indian solar technology. In fact, the Government of India has provided a USD 20 billion fund to establish ISA. The objective of this alliance aims at “better harmonising and aggregating demand for, inter alia, solar finance, solar technologies, innovation, research and development, and capacity building”.

The recognition of the International Solar Alliance in March 2018 by the United Nations, provides this international organisation with extra weight to promote the use of solar power and increase its commercialisation, in solar-rich countries and beyond.

France was involved from the start and supported the project. François Hollande attended the opening ceremony of the headquarters, and Emmanuel Macron came to the first international ISA meeting, as mentioned in the Economic Times. ISA wants to channel the French effort to involve more actively the European countries in the shift towards renewable energies, and subsequent market opportunities. A word to the wise.

Third Country
India
Share this Article