COP29 Monitoring Desk
ISLAMABAD: President Kassym-Jomart Tokayev, President of Azerbaijan Ilham Aliyev, and President of Uzbekistan Shavkat Mirziyoyev signed a strategic partnership agreement on production and transfer of green energy on Nov. 13 on the sidelines of the World Leaders Climate Action Summit, held as part of the 29th Conference of the Parties to the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (COP29) in Baku.
This opens up new opportunities for integrating the countries’ energy systems and creating reliable corridors to supply green energy to the European and other markets.
Azerbaijan President Ilham Aliyev, Kazakhstan President Kassym-Jomart Tokayev, and Uzbek President Shavkat Mirziyoyev heralded the agreement last Wednesday as a milestone for regional development.
The agreement provides for the joint construction of a clean energy cable underneath the Caspian Sea for exporting the renewable energy to European markets. The cable will be plugged to another cable line traversing the Black Sea’s seabed.
Azerbaijan’s President Ilham Aliyev said this “historic event” would further strengthen the brotherly relations between these three countries and pave the way for broader collaboration in green energy sphere.
“We are aware of the major plans and the results already achieved regarding the creation of renewable energy sources in Uzbekistan, Kazakhstan, and Azerbaijan. We are following, if I may say so, a parallel course, and the construction of an electric cable under the Caspian Sea is not only cooperation among our three countries; it is also cooperation on a wider scale,” President Aliyev stated.
He noted that a feasibility study for a green energy cable from Azerbaijan along the bottom of the Black Sea to Europe is nearing completion and this project will connect Central Asia, the Caucasus, Europe, the Caspian, and the Black seas with a single energy corridor.
Kazakhstan President Tokayev emphasized its transformative potential, calling it “ a new page in the history of our shared aspiration for sustainable development.”
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“The signing of the agreement on strategic partnership is an important stage in the trilateral cooperation for the development of the Central Asia and the South Caucasus regions,” President Tokayev said. “The document ushers ample opportunities for the integration of the energy systems of our states and for creation of reliable corridors for the supply of environmentally friendly energy to European and other markets.”
Kazakhstan, rich in both fossil fuels and renewable resources, is working to harness its immense wind and solar potential. The country has reached agreements with foreign partners to implement green projects with a total capacity of 43 gigawatts.
Uzbekistan’s President Mirziyoyev underscored the environmental benefits of the partnership.
“The energy to be transmitted is wind and solar energy, a renewable and clean source that will reduce the impact on the climate,” he said. “In doing so, we support the joint efforts to protect the climate under the Paris Agreement and achieve Sustainable Development Goals. Our countries have significant renewable energy resources and can make a great contribution to the global energy transition.”
The merging of energy systems will have a big impact on the energy landscape as a whole as well as for the three participating nations.
The Azerbaijani government’s commitment to shifting its energy reliance from conventional sources to alternative energy is among the priorities in national energy policy. It is expected that renewables will make up 30 percent of Azerbaijan’s electricity generation by 2030.
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The technical potential for renewable energy in Azerbaijan is estimated at 135 GW onshore and 157 GW offshore. Baku plans to build solar, wind, and hydro power stations of approximately 6 GW by 2030. Overall, the country has signed contracts and MoUs for 10 GW of renewable energy projects.
Although Kazakhstan ranks as one of the world’s largest crude oil exporters and holds three percent of the world’s total oil reserves, the country’s wind and solar potential are also substantial.
With more than half of the country’s territory seeing average wind speeds of 4 to 5 meters per second – suitable for energy generation – Kazakhstan has significant renewable energy potential.
According to UN estimates, the wind potential of Kazakhstan is 1.8 trillion kWh per year, close to ten times Kazakhstan’s current energy consumption. Solar also has great potential given the number of sunny hours per year – typically between 2,200 and 3,000 – implying a capacity of 1,300-1,800 kW/sqm per year.
Uzbekistan has set an ambitious goal to increase the share of renewable energy sources to 40 percent by 2030, and also create 4.2 gigawatts of energy storage systems.
In addition, Uzbekistan is planning to connect an additional 2.6 gigawatts of renewable generation and 300 MW of energy storage systems to the grid by the end of the year. Every year the country commission about 2 gigawatts of solar and wind generation capacity.
Energy ministers of the three countries and Saudi Arabia also signed an executive program to cooperate in green energy development and transfer.
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