Sustainable energy, transportation, and resilience in the Caribbean

The Caribbean Forum on Energy, Transport, and Resilience was held at the Bay Gardens Hotel, Rodney Bay, Saint Lucia, from June 26 to 27, 2019. It was hosted by the Organization of American States (OAS) and the Government of Saint Lucia, with support from the Organisation of Eastern Caribbean States (OECS) Commission. With the objective of exploring new technologies and combining them with existing regional experiences in sustainable urban development, the event had an overall goal to design a roadmap for the Caribbean smart cities of the future. The forum sought to further public-private exchanges among governments, energy and transportation...

Using Forecasting Systems to Reduce Cost and Improve Dispatch of Variable Renewable Energy

This technical guide is the fourth in a series of four technical guides on variable renewable energy (VRE) grid integration produced by the Energy Sector Management Assistance Program (ESMAP) of the World Bank and the Global Sustainable Electricity Partnership (GSEP). It provides guidance on the role and benefits of forecasting as a cost-effective operational solution to manage the uncertainty of VRE generation and facilitate the integration of larger shares of these resources in the energy mix. The guide focuses primarily on the types of forecasting methods and how physical and statistical models are used for developing short- to long-term forecasts....

Improving the Investment Climate for Renewable Energy Through Benefit Sharing, Risk Management, and Local Community Engagement

The report, a joint effort between the World Bank’s Social Development Global Practice and International Finance Corporation (IFC) advisory services, is based on the idea that local engagement, for example, through benefit sharing, is an important way for better risk management and creating a more enabling environment for renewable energy development. It finds that the underlying causes of the conflicts are diverse, complex, and dynamic: influencing factors include historical struggles over poverty and inequality, land ownership, mistrust in public and private institutions, a lack of free, prior and informed consultations (FPIC) before investment flows into the region and oftentimes a...

Funding the Sun : New Paradigms for Financing Off-Grid Solar Companies

This report elucidates the role of financial innovation in the off-grid solar sector and provides a roadmap for practitioners, financiers, and entrepreneurs navigating capital raises for companies active in the sector. It examines a full range of established and frontier financing options. It illustrates that some technology-enabled financial innovations, such as peer-to-peer business lending, are already playing an important role in the sector. It was prepared by the World Bank Group and the Cambridge Centre for Alternative Finance, the University of Cambridge Judge Business School, with support from ESMAP.

Economic Analysis of Battery Energy Storage Systems

The recent advances in battery technology and reductions in battery costs have brought battery energy storage systems (BESS) to the point of becoming increasingly cost-effective projects to serve a range of power sector interventions, especially when combined with PV and where diesel is the alternative, or where subsidies or incentives are used. Quantifying the economic impact of BESS requires a high level of temporal granularity in the analysis, because the time-steps required for a reliable assessment of costs and benefits are much shorter than the usual annual time steps of many power sector investment projects. In short, there is as...

Demystifying the Costs of Electricity Generation Technologies

The levelized cost of electricity is the most common indicator used to compare the cost competitiveness of electricity-generating technologies. Several studies claim that some renewable energy technologies, particularly utility-scale solar photovoltaic and onshore wind, are cost-competitive with fossil fuel–based technologies. However, there is no consensus on this point considering the wide variations in factors that influence the levelized costs of electricity across countries and technologies. This study calculates more than 4,000 levelized costs of electricity for 11 technologies, varying key input variables. The study shows that the levelized costs of electricity for renewable electricity technologies, except concentrated solar and offshore...

FI Training: Regional RE EE Financing Experiences – The 8 Rivers Experience – Angella Rainford

FI Training: Regional RE EE Financing Experiences – The Wigton Experience – Wigton Wind Farm

FI Training: Regional Sustainable Energy Landscape – Key Trends – Sapphire Vital

FI Training: Regulatory and Policy Framework Considerations – Cornelia Schenk