Working Groups

Energy Working Group

Contributing more than 70% of global GHG emissions, the energy sector plays a dominant role in causing climate change. It is also instrumental for creating climate-compatible societies and thus a crucial focus of the design of low emission development strategies (LEDS). Providing reliable, affordable, and clean energy for all is a universally agreed UN Sustainable Development Goal (SDG-7). Achieving it will be essential for many other social, economic, and environmental objectives.  

The Energy Working Group (EWG) supports the deployment of innovative and climate-compatible development strategies in the energy sector. Launched in 2011, the EWG is the LEDS GP’s longest standing work stream, bringing together over 1100 practitioners from national governments, multilateral institutions, non-governmental organisations, and the private sector. The EWG assists countries around the world through advisory services and technical support, as well as peer-to-peer learning, knowledge sharing and other capacity-building initiatives. A key focus of our work is the advancement of Communities of Practices (CoPs) that bridge our activities from in-country technical assistance to group learnings to broad dissemination of knowledge products. Our services are offered free-of-charge to practitioners. 

How We Work

On the global scale, our activities involve hosting webinars, disseminating relevant tools, providing targeted trainings, and drafting written knowledge products for all members of the EWG.

On the regional scale we work through three Communities of Practice (CoP): the Africa LEDS Partnership Mini-Grids CoP, the Asia LEDS Partnership Grid-Integrated CoP, and the Latin America and the Caribbean (LAC) LEDS Partnership Bioenergy CoP. The regional CoPs organize closed meetings and public webinars; develop policy guides and best-practice case studies; provide direct technical assistance to individual members; and organize country exchanges so that our members can learn from each other.

Communities of Practice

Communities of practice are spaces for members interested in a specific topic to regularly learn from peers, exchange knowledge, connect with others, pilot ideas, co-design solutions, and receive technical assistance. CoPs are demand driven and evolve dynamically to meet their members’ needs.

Mini-Grids Community of Practice (AfLP)

This CoP is coordinated by our Africa LEDS Partnership (AfLP) and focuses on:

Building an enabling environment for mini-grid deployment in African Countries through peer-to-peer learning for state and non-state actors.

Grid-Integrated Renewable Energy Community of Practice (Asia)

This CoP is coordinated by our Asia LEDS Partnership (ALP) and focuses on:

Net-Zero pathway planning, distributed energy resources and battery energy storage systems, and innovative financing for renewable energy deployment.

Bioenergy Community of Practice (LAC)

This CoP is coordinated by our Latin America and the Caribbean (LAC) LEDS Partnership and focuses on:

Integrating bioenergy in national energy and climate policies and linking bioenergy projects with financing through capacity building, peer-to-peer learning, and technical assistance.

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Coordinating Bodies

The Energy Working Group is guided by a team of international experts from the U.S. Department of Energy’s National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL), with collaborative support from the regional platforms (Libélula, SouthSouthNorth, ICLEI), CoP coordinators, and others.

Faces of the Energy Working Group

Josh Ogada

AfLP mini-grid CoP coordinator (SSN)

Aida Lorenzo

LAC bioenergy CoP coordinator

Anandhan Subramaniyam

ALP Grid-Integrated Renewable energy CoP coordinator (ICLEI)

Tim Reber

AfLP Energy Working Group coordinator (NREL)

Daniella Rough

LAC Energy Working Group coordinator (NREL)

Akhilesh Magal

ALP Energy Working Group coordinator (NREL)