Vice President Yılmaz: Türkiye has tripled its renewable installed capacity in the last 10 years

Yılmaz spoke at the "Global Electricity Grids Accelerator Session" held within the scope of the 31st Conference of the Parties (COP31) to the United Nations (UN) Framework Convention on Climate Change held in Antalya.

Stating that renewable energy is growing at an unprecedented rate in history, but the networks are not growing at the same rate, Yılmaz said that today, more than 2,500 gigawatts of renewable energy projects in the world are waiting in line for grid connection due to the need for new networks and old infrastructures.

Stating that annual global grid investments have reached approximately 450 billion dollars, Yılmaz stated that this investment should increase by 50 percent in the next 3 years in order to connect more renewable energy, integrate storage systems, create a charging infrastructure for electric vehicles and disseminate efficient technologies powered by electricity.

Yılmaz stated the following:

"We must design our networks according to tomorrow's needs, not according to today's demand. Extreme weather events are no longer an exception, but a part of our planning assumptions. By making our networks more durable, we must create an infrastructure that can recover quickly after possible damage, meet critical energy needs without interruption, and support local production. For this, more than 80 million kilometers of lines will need to be renewed or built by 2040. Clean energy without a grid is like a vehicle that cannot go on the road. Turkey has increased its renewable installed capacity in the last 10 years." "It has tripled. What makes this possible is our investment in the grid along with production. Our system, which works synchronously with the European continental grid, has made Türkiye an energy bridge between Europe, the Caucasus, the Middle East and Central Asia."

"We are ready to share our experience with our partners"

Yılmaz stated that the target of 8 gigawatts of new renewable capacity every year until 2035 is planned together with investments in transmission, storage and system flexibility, and said, "We are ready to share our experience, especially with our partners in Africa and ASEAN." he said.

Reminding that, as the COP31 Presidency, they set the goal of increasing the share of electricity in global final energy consumption to 35 percent by 2035, Yılmaz said:

"This goal cannot be achieved without networks. The Accelerator and the 35 by 35 Commitment are two initiatives that complement each other. We attach importance to the 3 principles of the accelerator: Based on the priorities determined by governments, combining existing financing with projects instead of establishing a new institution, and focusing on project preparation. With the Climate Implementation Bridge (BRIDGE), we will support this approach and contribute to the transformation of network projects into investable portfolios."