11 November 2017: The International Renewable Energy Agency (IRENA) launched a social media campaign and released a report during the Bonn Climate Change Conference (COP 23), highlighting the economic and environmental impact of renewable energy and calling on countries to increase renewable energy targets in their next round of Nationally Determined Contributions (NDC’s).

IRENA’s social media campaign, #Renewables4Climate, allows users to share stories regarding the ways that companies, governments, organizations and individuals are leveraging renewable energy to achieve positive change. The platform is hosting conversations on the role of renewables in promoting climate resilience and adaptation, and reducing energy poverty and pollution. IRENA uses the platform to highlight the organization’s view that 100% renewable energy deployment must be achieved by 2050 in order to meet the lower bound of the objective of the Paris Agreement to limit temperature increase to 1.5° C, noting the impact that renewable energy has on job creation, improved public health, and energy security. Social media participants use the platform to share quotes from the COP by public figures, including, for example, California’s Governor Jerry Brown, and to publicize COP 23 events related to renewable energy.

Many countries are more optimistic on renewable energy in their national energy strategies than they are in their their NDC’s.

IRENA also released a report at COP 23 titled, ‘Untapped Potential for Climate Action: Renewable Energy in Nationally Determined Contributions.’ The publication calls for countries to incorporate more ambitious renewable energy targets into the next round of NDCs. Current NDC’s underestimate the actual rate of renewable energy deployment, the study states, noting that many countries are more actually more optimistic on renewable energy in their national energy strategies than they are in their their NDC’s. While current NDC’s call for a global annual increase of 80 GW of renewable energy capacity between 2015-2030, an average of 125 GW of renewable energy capacity were added each year between 2010-2016. IRENA’s report claims that by integrating these more ambitious figures into their NDC’s, nations would send a signal to the international finance community, which could facilitate the mobilization of the investments and accelerate the energy transition.

In publicizing this report, IRENA also announced that the institution has created a new facility to provide countries with strategic planning and technical support to assist them in raising the level of renewable energy ambitions in their NDCs. [IRENA Press Release. 11 November 2017 #Renewables4Climate] [Renewables4Climate Website] [IRENA Press Release. 10 November. Report on Untapped Potentials] [Publication: Untapped Potential for Climate Action: Renewable Energy in Nationally Determined Contributions]