Al-Mashat: Egypt Signs Letter of Intent to Join BESS of GEAPP

During the activities of the United Nations Climate Conference COP28 in the United Arab Emirates, the Arab Republic of Egypt joined the Battery Energy Storage Systems Alliance (BESS), which is one of the main initiatives of the Global Energy Alliance for People and Planet (GEAPP), bringing the number of joining countries to 10 countries, as the letter of intent was signed by the Minister of International Cooperation, H.E. Dr. Rania. A. Al-Mashat, and the Minister of Electricity and Renewable Energy, H.E. Dr. Muhammad Shaker Al-Marqabi.

The alliance aims to enhance joint work to secure 5 GWs of stored energy by 2024, and take a step towards achieving the alliance’s goals of achieving 400 GWs of renewable energy to meet the global energy need by 2030.

The BESS Alliance aims to accelerate efforts aimed at expanding reliable and efficient renewable energy storage systems, especially for low and middle-income countries, meeting the growing demand for energy in those countries, and enabling about 3 billion people around the world to have access to electricity.

Al-Mashat confirmed that there is a growing global interest in adopting energy storage technologies to accommodate the growing demand for renewable energy sources, stressing that energy storage is one of the indispensable solutions to overcome the growing need and demand for renewable energy, especially by developing countries and low-middle-income countries.

H.E. referred to the report published by the International Renewable Energy Agency (IRENA) and the G20 Presidency on providing low-cost financing for the energy transition, which stressed that it is necessary to accelerate the deployment of energy storage technologies as one of the vital mechanisms to ensure a successful global transition to renewable energy to achieve climate goals and achieve sustainable energy development, pointing out that Egypt's joining the GEAPP is in line with its priorities to implement the National Sustainable Energy Strategy 2035, increase the proportion of renewable energy in the energy mix to reach 42% by 2030, and implement the Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs) and the National Climate Change Strategy.

Al-Mashat also said she appreciated the close cooperation between relevant parties in the BESS alliance, such as the African Development Bank (AfDB), the World Bank, the Asian Development Bank, the Inter-American Development Bank, the French Development Agency (AFD), the German International Cooperation Agency (GIZ), and the Africa 50 Fund, in addition to private sector companies such as Infinity Power, the Sustainable Energy for All (SEforALL), along with other countries and partners.

H.E. affirmed the government’s commitment to strengthening work with international partners to stimulate a fair transition to renewable energy. The first agreement was signed between the Norwegian company SCATEC and the Ministry of Electricity in Egypt, to generate 1 GW of solar energy with BESS battery energy storage solutions. The project is the first of its kind in Egypt and the largest in the region with these technologies, with the participation and support of international financial institutions, namely the Norwegian government, the AfDB, British International Investment (BII), and the American Finance Corporation (DFC).

Al-Mashat stated that these efforts would achieve global goals aimed at operating storage capacities amounting to 359 GWs by 2030 to meet the goals of maintaining the Earth’s temperature at 1.5 degrees Celsius.

In her speech, Al-Mashat touched on national efforts to stimulate green transformation and the transition to renewable energy through the energy pillar within the NWFE program, which aims to stop operating thermal power plants with a capacity of 5 GWs by 2025, and launch renewable energy plants -solar and wind- with a capacity of 10 GWs by 2028. Within this framework, agreements have been signed to implement projects with a capacity of 3.7 GWs during 2023, in cooperation with the private sector and in participation with development partners and international financing institutions.

It is worth noting that it organized a preliminary event ahead of COP28, which witnessed the launch of the first follow-up progress report of the NWFE program, on the occasion of the one-year anniversary of the launch of the program. The report revealed that the total financial pledges from multilateral and bilateral development partners to implement the components of the energy pillar amounted to about $3.2 billion over the past year. Over a year of joint work, these efforts were carried out in cooperation with national authorities, the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD) - the main development partner of the energy pillar - and other international institutions.

Among these pledges are $2 billion in investments directed to the private sector to stimulate its participation in renewable energy projects, and $1.5 billion in the form of concessional development financing and development grants, in addition to a debt swap worth €104 million.