Brussels, 23/03/2010 (Agence Europe) - Official Spanish sources have announced that on 11 and 12 May in Valencia, the Spanish Department of Trade, Industry and Tourism, in collaboration with the European Commission, is organising a conference on prospects for developing solar energy in the Mediterranean. Developing a “Mediterranean Solar Plan” is among the six priority projects being put forward by the Union for the Mediterranean (UfM). One of the objectives of this “strategic project”, devised for “responding to the expected rise in demand for Euro-Mediterranean energy and the need to reduce greenhouse gas emissions” is the development of capacity in renewable electricity to the tune of 20 GW by 2020. The plan also seeks to encourage more economic energy use, energy efficiency and the transfer of energies linked to this sector. One of the developments in this plan is to draw up an appropriate regulatory framework for promoting the penetration of renewable energies for facilitating trade, indicated the same Spanish source.
The French co-presidency of the UfM, which was behind the initiative to launch the Mediterranean Solar Plan (MSP) explained that the project would be “integrating and completing existing activities in the domain of Euro-Mediterranean cooperation on renewable energies and network integration”. It intends to set up “legislative, regulatory and institutional frameworks adapted to the massive development of sustainable and profitable projects in the domain of renewable energies, particularly solar, and the development of energy efficiency measures and control of energy demand with a view to reaching the 20% energy-saving objective by 2020 compared to 2005 levels; the facilitation of electricity interconnection developments between euro-Mediterranean countries and implementation of a valid incentive scheme for exporting renewable energy from the South and East of the Mediterranean to Europe, the promotion of technological cooperation, including the creation of axes and networks for regional competitiveness linking industrial actors and research and development institutions”. Further information: http://www.mediterraneansolarplan-conference.es. (F.B./transl.fl)