Experts call for realising renewable energy potentials instead of blaming limitations

Highlights:

• Any amount of renewable energy produced by realising the country's potentials would reduce its dependence on fossil fuel
• Bangladesh has set a target to increase the portion of renewable energy to 10% of its total electricity generation, and to 40% by 2041
• The current share of renewable energy in the country's power generation capacity is only 4%
• The government should stop making capacity payments for unused power plants, said experts

In order to achieve the renewable energy target and reduce dependency on fossil fuel, Bangladesh needs to stop blaming its limitations and try to ensure the best use of the existing potentials, economists have said.

Bangladesh may not be able to develop a big capacity in the renewable energy sector due to different limitations, but any amount of renewable energy the country can produce as per its potential will reduce its dependence on fossil fuel, said Israt Hossain, senior research associate of Sanem, at the seminar on "Youth's Perception on Renewable Energy" in the capital on Monday.

The South Asian Network on Economic Modeling (Sanem) and Economics Study Centre of the Dhaka University organised the programme.

At the seminar, Md Abul Kalam Azad, manager of ActionAid, said, "Whether we want it or not, we have to shift to renewable energy sooner or later, because fossil fuels will be finished one day."

He also said presenting the scarcity of land as a reason for the poor progress in the solar energy sector is wrong. "We can produce solar energy without wasting a single katha of land," he added.

Aziza Sultana Mukti, head of operations of SOLshare Ltd, said, "The young generation should work on finding ways of utilising our potential instead of going abroad and applying other countries' technologies in our country."

Bangladesh has set a target to increase the portion of renewable energy to 10% of its total electricity generation, and to 40% by 2041.

Hasin Isharq, a student of economics at Dhaka University, said achieving the target would be quite difficult as the current share of renewable energy in the country's power generation capacity is only 4%.

"We would have been in a good position to achieve the renewable energy target if we could invest in this sector with the money we poured into building LNG facilities and LNG import," he said.

Regarding the capacity payment system, Dr Sakib Bin Amin, an associate professor of economics at North South University, said for a certain period it was needed to encourage private investors to invest in the power sector, but now time has come to stop such payments in case of unused power plants.

Sanem Research Director Dr Sayema Haque of Bidisha, who chaired and moderated the seminar, said affordability and availability of fuel is the main concern in ensuring energy security.

"For a sustainable energy transition, we need to think about the cost and benefit of the fuel used in future," she said.    

Dr Selim Raihan, executive director of Sanem, and Farha Tasneem, president of Economics Study Center, delivered the welcome address at the seminar.