Shaikh Nawaf lauds workshop on renewable energies

CEO of Electricity and Water Authority, Chairman of the Board of Trustees of the Regional Centre for Renewable Energies and Energy Efficiency (RCREEE) , Shaikh Nawaf Bin Ibrahim Bin Hamad Al Khalifa stressed that the workshop on "Integration of Renewable Energies with Electricity Grids" in the Arab area, is considered an important step in the Arab World’s march towards a sustainable future for energy. Shaikh Nawaf also asserted that there had been a reinforcement on the political obligations earlier this year on the "Arab Strategy for Renewable Energy" which its implementation requires concerted efforts not only at the political and organizational level, but also at the technical level. The workshop highlighted that the technical support should take its due space, and for that reason, and during the workshop, there has been an attention paid to the technical side of the Arab strategy. The workshop was held in Kingdom of Bahrain with the presence of a number of representatives of the Arab States, and delegations from League of Arab States, (RCREEE), the Arab Union of Electricity, as well as from the Arab Fund and District Industrial initiative. The workshop discussed two questions: how to integrate the facilities of the renewable energies into the current electricity grids for the transmission and distribution? and what are the required additional investments to preserve security, reliability and operability in the current electrical grids? The workshop included a group of Arab experts, and distinctive international experts to exchange valuable experiences to define the expected challenges resulting from integrating large-capacities of the renewable energies into the existing electrical grids for transmission and distribution to achieve full integration between the sources of renewable energies and the electrical grids. The participants in the workshop came out with recommendations in regard of laying regional directive principles that help national grid operators to overcome and confront the current challenges. These principles will be side by side with the Arab renewable energy framework and national action plans for renewable energy, which will form the basis for the successful implementation of the strategy of renewable energy in the Arab world