Partnerships aimed at helping less affluent countries transition to clean energy "have been long on promise but short on progress," Rockefeller Foundation President Rajiv Shah said in a report on Just Energy Transition Partnerships released Feb. 15.
"While JETPs are a political and financial innovation, the process to date has been slow, and the financing has failed to flow as quickly or at the scale initially promised," said the report with recommendations for more effectively scaling the concept.
The Rockefeller Foundation and the Environmental Defense Fund together are seeking ways to improve the partnerships, including a pilot program in the Philippines to invest up to $165 billion until 2050 to accelerate renewable power and grid capacity.
The first JETP model announced in 2021 in South Africa has since expanded to Indonesia, Vietnam and Senegal. Three of the deals support a just transition to clean power from coal, while the Senegal deal is working to deploy renewables.
Still, more than 90% of all increased spending in renewables is going into developed countries and China, the report said.
The report recommends several changes, including a more effective on-ramp for interested countries, involvement of multilateral development banks, and more support from developed countries in the International Partners Group of donors. The report also noted "the heavy political burden this model has placed" on those donor countries.
The next wave of countries interested in JETP-like packages of support includes Colombia, Kazakhstan, Kenya, Mexico, Mongolia, Nigeria, the Philippines and Thailand, the report said.
Options for better meeting that interest include avoiding high-level political deals and instead having a nationally owned institutional venue bring stakeholders together to develop a nationally appropriate investment plan.
"While JETPs are only one piece of the energy transition puzzle, they could and should play a bigger, more effective role in empowering vulnerable people in emerging and developing economies with clean energy," Shah said.
