At a seminar organised by Shakti Sustainable Energy Foundation on February 13, 2023, Shri Saurabh Kumar, Head of Global Energy Alliance for People and Planet (GEAPP), India, spoke about GEAPP’s Vision and Priorities in India.
Shri Saurabh Kumar, an internationally recognised authority on the design and implementation of scalable, replicable and impactful business models for promoting energy efficiency across sectors, has earlier served as Chairperson of Energy Efficiency Services Limited (EESL) and Secretary of the Bureau of Energy Efficiency (BEE). GEAPP – has a mission is to support developing countries’ shift to a clean energy, pro-growth model that ensures universal energy access, unlocking a new era of inclusive economic growth, while enabling the global community to meet critical climate goals during the next decade.
Shri Saurabh Kumar unlocked GEAPP India V2.0 that includes Distributed Renewable Energy, Green Mobility, Decarbonisation, and Knowledge Hub & Centre of Excellence. He elaborated that GEAPP India’s Framework for program development strategy includes key elements that are aligned with the national priorities, alliance partners and key public and private sector players. The aim of the strategy is to provide significant leverage, in terms of funding and impact, with GEAPP operating as the ‘engine room’. The India strategy of GEAPP is closely aligned with its global strategy that include:
- influencing top-down;
- delivering deep impact; and
- delivering scalable solutions.
The seminar threw light on the key focus areas, key program areas and cross cutting impact areas for GEAPP India. The three pillars of its focus are: a) Access that includes Decentralised Solar Energy and Waste to Energy; b) Decarbonisation that includes Battery Energy Storage, Mobility and Industrial Energy efficiency and c) Green Jobs that includes ENTICE Centre of Innovation & Entrepreneurship, Waste to Energy and Green Entrepreneurship for engaging with youth. An important priority area of GEAPP is Capacity Development through initiatives such as GREAT, a global resource centre to enable replication of Energy Efficiency through G20/B20 process and a People Centric Energy Transition Centre at Ashoka University for New Age Clean Energy Policies and Regulations.
Shri Saurabh Kumar emphasised that through its Monitoring, Evaluating and Learning (MEL) framework, GEAPP India aims to enhance its capacity to be more effective, maximise impact and help in unlocking developmental fundings. An important purpose of the MEL approach is to align objectives with that of the government and its alliance partners; transparent & measurable data collection, quality analytics and reporting mechanism for its partners and creating case studies and stories from the ground.
The seminar ended with Shri Saurabh Kumar stating that GEAPP is looking forward to a fruitful partnership with Shakti Sustainable Energy foundation in areas.