Bangladesh to get technical support from ISA

International Solar Alliance (ISA) will provide technical support to Bangladesh to pull in financing to the renewable energy sector.

“We’ll help Bangladesh find a right policy to introduce a right business model for investment in the solar power sector,” said ISA director general Ajay Mathur while addressing a press briefing at a hotel in Dhaka on Thursday.

State Minister for Power, Energy and Mineral Resources Nasrul Hamid was present at the signing event as the chief guest, according to a ministry

press release.

“We are prioritising renewable and clean energy. We have identified challenges of solar rooftop and floating solar projects. We will proceed according to the roadmap,” he said.

The ISA is an alliance of 123 signatory countries based on an intergovernmental treaty whose primary objective is to work for efficient consumption of solar energy to reduce dependence on fossil fuels.

The remarks came following Bangladesh’s signing of a strategic country partnership agreement with the ISA to accelerate the development of solar energy.

Power secretary Habibur Rahman and DG of ISA Ajay Mathur signed the agreement on behalf of their respective sides.

The ISA chief informed that the land scarcity and right technological solution have the biggest challenge in achieving a target to the government to generate 40 percent of electricity from renewable sources by 2041.

“Options like floating solar could be an ideal solution for Bangladesh… We’ll be working to find innovative ideas,” he said.

Habibur Rahman informed that a total of 8 projects were undertaken to implement under the agreement with ISA.

These include installations of 12 trolley mounted portable solar irrigation systems of about 2Kw capacity, 12c portable solar paddy threshers of about 2kW capacity, 2 rooftop solar projects with capacity of 22 kW, solar cold storage for preservation of agricultural produce, development of rooftop project at Chattagram or any other railway station, installation of floating solar project in Gazipur and Munshiganj.

Conversion of two manually operated sluice gates to floating solar-powered auto sluice gates in two sites under Bangladesh Water Development Board is also included under the agreement.

Jiangbo Ning, deputy country director of the Asian Development Board (ADB) in Bangladesh, who also addressed at the press briefing, said planned to convert 3,000 diesel-powered irrigation pumps into solar-powered one.