Strengthening Energy Planning Capacity in Latin America and the Caribbean

In supporting UN-ECLAC, GET.transform contributes to paving the way for a greater share of variable renewable energy in the region
Drone view of Santiago de Chile, Chile
Photo by Francisco Kemeny

Latin America and the Caribbean (LAC) has one of the cleanest electricity generation mixes worldwide (60% from renewable energies in 2015). The region has made important progress in fulfilling its various commitments to sustainable energy, reaching a renewability index of 2020. However, clean generation is mainly represented by large hydroelectric facilities: despite steady growth, solar and wind energy only made up 6% of the total electricity generation mix of the region. Important changes in the energy sector will therefore be required to accommodate growth in variable renewable energy generation.

Technical, economic, and regulatory challenges need to be surpassed to effectively incorporate renewable energies in forecasting models in the region. To this end, the Regional Technical Forum for Energy Planners (FOREPLEN), an international cooperation framework founded by the UN Economic Commission of Latin America and the Caribbean (UN-ECLAC) brings together planners to foster transnational cooperation, compare lessons learned, and share best practices to support energy transformation in the region.

GET.transform supports FOREPLEN and the Latin American and Caribbean region with in-depth regional energy planning research and analysis, as well as coordination and implementation of regional exchanges among professionals and government leaders supporting multi-stakeholder collaboration that help countries move closer to achieving the 2030 Agenda.

GET.transform has supported the analysis of best practices and challenges in energy planning in eight key countries in the region, leading to multiple joint publications with UN-ECLAC.

Working together with IRENA, GET.transform contributed to the coordination and implementation of seven virtual seminars on long-term energy planning in the framework of IRENA’s Long-Term Energy Scenarios (LTES) initiative.

In continued collaboration with UN ECLAC, GET.transform will support FOREPLEN ’s commitment to strengthening the network of energy planning practitioners, and will focus on the implications of electromobility in energy planning, as well as the most relevant related topics in the region.