A high level international conference on renewable energy and international cooperation in the energy transition is taking place in Berlin today.
“It will become ever more important for us to engage in cross-border cooperation and share and discuss best practices with other countries,” the conference will hear.
In a statement issued at the opening of The Global Ministerial Conference on System Integration of Renewables, Peter Altmaier, Germany’s minister for economics and energy also reiterated Germany’s intention to achieve 65% of electricity generation from renewable sources by 2030 and said Germany’s own energy transition rests on “three pillars” of solar and wind power expansion, energy sector digitalisation and sector coupling.
The conference, co-organised by the German government and the International Energy Agency (IEA), will feature speeches from senior ministers representing countries including Sweden, Thailand, Japan, Morocco, Poland, Switzerland and the US.
Senior officials from international organisations and corporate chiefs will also attend the conference.
Dr Fatih Birol, the IEA’s executive director also emphasised the need for cross-border cooperation and knowledge sharing in the energy transition.
While declining costs offered by renewables are a “huge opportunity … power systems need to become more flexible and market designs must be adapted in order to avoid unintended impacts on electricity security”, he said.