According to the International Renewable Energy Agency (IRENA), the number of household solar power systems in Bangladesh has jumped from 25,000 to 2.8 million in the last 10 years.
IDCOL has ambitious targets to multiply this figure further and the country is installing small photovoltaic systems at a rate of 80,000 a month.
This is important progress and needs to be supported more widely. As a nation that is highly vulnerable to the negative impacts of climate change, it is vital Bangladesh keep increasing the pace of our efforts to increase renewable energy production.
The IPCC has told the UN that in order to keep global average temperature rise within manageable limits, greenhouse gas emissions have to be cut to near zero by 2100. This means reducing world emissions by between 40% and 70% within the next 35 years.
Leading the way on converting to clean energy can bring multiple benefits. For a start, we urgently need to reduce our reliance on fossil fuels anyway given their cost and finite nature. More importantly, we need to raise living standards by providing more people with reliable electricity in order to increase peoples’ resilience to adapting and coping with climate change.
The government should do more to incentivise renewable energy production, by cutting subsidies on fossil fuels. With over 114,000 people working in the solar industry already in Bangladesh, there is plenty of scope for this to create new jobs as well as helping us play our part in the clean energy revolution.
