IRENA at the Global Clean Energy Action Forum (CEM13/MI-7)
The Global Clean Energy Action Forum (GCEAF) was a joint convening of the 13th Clean Energy Ministerial (CEM13) and 7th Mission Innovation Ministerial (MI-7) hosted by the US Department of Energy and Carnegie Mellon University. Between 21 and 23 September 2022 in Pittsburgh, US a series of both in-person/hybrid, closed-door/open-to-the-public events took place on key energy topics. IRENA participated and organised the following events:
22 September 2022| 8:00 – 9:15 UTC-4
The Call to Action Plenary
At COP26 in Glasgow, the world launched the Breakthrough Agenda to strengthen international climate action and dramatically scale and speed up the deployment of clean energy technologies and drive down costs. Under the UK leadership, IRENA alongside the IEA and UN HLCH drafted the Breakthrough Agenda Report 2022 covering the power, steel, transport and agriculture sectors and hydrogen. This closed-door session brought together leading voices across the global energy community to reflect on remaining gaps and opportunities for global energy cooperation, including through the CEM and MI, to inspire policymakers, businesses, innovators and the entire energy community.
Open to Ministers and Special Guests
22 September 2022 | 9:30 – 10:30 UCT-4
Ministerial Roundtable - Power System Transformation: Driving Decarbonization
IRENA’s Director General participated in this public-private roundtable alongside Ministers, C-Suite Executives and other leaders from across sectors to discuss leading best practices and priority actions to enable secure, affordable power system transformation and create robust pathways to enable fully decarbonised power systems.
Ministers and Special Guests by Invitation
22 September | 12:30 – 13:30 UTC-4
Job Creation and Gender Balance in the Energy Transition: Priority Actions and Perspective
The event highlighted key findings from two new reports by IRENA: Renewable Energy and Jobs – Annual Review 2022 (in collaboration with ILO) and Solar PV: A Gender Perspective as well as insights from the IRENA Collaborative Framework on Just and Inclusive Energy Transitions co-facilitated by the US and South Africa. The session discussed policy implications for building a well-skilled and diverse renewable energy workforce, highlight broader socioeconomic impacts and consider key actions to ensure a just transition for workers and communities.
22 September 2022 | 15:00 – 16:00 UTC-4
Pathways for Rapid Decarbonisation of Power Systems
This side event, led by CEM’s 21CPP initiative and co-organised with several workstreams including IRENA’s LTES Initiative, highlighted multiple perspectives and delivered coherent insights regarding key efforts the CEM community is leading to advance implementation, raise ambition, and accelerate deployment of low carbon solutions, and highlighted leading efforts for system wide and industrial solutions.
23 September 2022 | 10:15 – 11:15 UTC-4
Accelerating technology-based carbon removals: BECCS and DAC
This side event co-organised by the CEM CCUS Initiative, IRENA, IEAGHG and DAC Coalition aimed to enhance the understanding of the current state and future potential of technology-based CDR technologies and CO2 transport and storage infrastructure and how both MI and CEM can accelerate their uptake via collaboration and a unique joint platform.
23 September 2022 | 11:30 – 12:30 UTC-4
Global dialogue on long-term transition pathways for road transport
This side event co-organised by IRENA’s LTES Initiative, Energy Foundation China and China EV100 gathered government officials and industry experts from around the world to discuss the key drivers and uncertainties around the development of the future transportation system that need to be reflected in long-term energy scenarios and how long-term scenarios can be made useful for guiding the development of the transportation industry.
See proceedings here.
23 September 2022 | 11:30 – 12:30 UTC-4
G7 Hydrogen Action pact - Facilitating and Accelerating PtX-Market Ramp-up
This side event was co-organised with PTX Hub and IPHE. With the introduction from the G7 Presidency, speakers from IRENA, H2Global, First Movers Coalition (WEF) and IPHE discussed the aims of the G7 Hydrogen Action Pact and IRENA recommendations to accelerate the activities of the G7 members under the Pact, for CEM/MI stakeholders to better understand the enabling factors to accelerate the market ramp-up of renewable and low-carbon hydrogen.
23 September 2022 | 11:30 – 13:45 UTC-4
Innovation cooperation: global approaches to enhancing national policies and measuring progress
This side event co-organised by the Mission Innovation, IRENA, IEA, European Commission, the Government of India’s Department of Bioenergy and the IIT Delhi focused on two important areas of cooperation: exchange of policy experiences in the widest range of national contexts and methods to measure the progress of innovative solutions for evidence-based policy making. It explored the latest insights from government efforts and how they can support the delivery of MI 2.0 and CEM objectives.