Energy Minister Parviz Shahbazov met with Charles Cormier, Infrastructure Regional Director for Europe and Central Asia as well as Rolande Pryce, Regional Director for the South Caucasus at the World Bank.
According to the Ministry, the sides exchanged views on existing projects implemented in the energy sector of Azerbaijan, new cooperation opportunities, including renewable energy, energy efficiency, modernization of power grids, energy storage systems, rooftop solar energy and regional energy projects.
The progress of the AZURE project, implemented jointly with the World Bank, was discussed and the importance of the project in terms of sustainable integration of renewable energy powers into the power grid was emphasized. The importance of modernizing, digitizing and increasing the reliability of power transmission and distribution networks in the light of the growing demand for data centers and artificial intelligence, electric vehicles was noted.
The cooperation opportunities with the World Bank on Caspian-Black Sea-European Green Energy Corridor project were also discussed. The interaction of the Caspian - Black Sea - European Green Energy Corridor and Georgian - Romanian Black Sea Submarine Cable projects, the contribution of these initiatives to European energy security and their role in regional integration were also considered. The opportunities for expanding Azerbaijan's role as a regional energy supplier in terms of gas exports as well as electricity were touched upon. The work done in the field of energy efficiency and future steps in this direction were also discussed at the meeting. The current potential for reducing energy consumption in public buildings, the activities of the Energy Efficiency Fund, as well as the possibilities of applying international experience were discussed. It was considered expedient to continue technical assistance and knowledge exchange in this area.
