GUEST & SPEAKER STRUCTURE

Chief Guest: Mr. Zahir Uddin Swapan - MP — Political Adviser to the Prime Minister

Moderator : Dr. M. Rezwan Khan, Professor Emeritus, Dept. of EEE & Executive Director, IAR

Keynote Speaker: S M Monirul Islam, Managing Director (Acting), IdCol
Panelist (Government): Bangladesh Power Development Board (BPDB)
Panelist (Government):   Representative from SREDA should join
Panelists (Private): Hmaco/Akij

Panelists (Development Partner): Delegation of the European Union to Bangladesh

Panelists (Innovator): Dr. Sebastian Groh, founder and CEO, SOLshare, EcoFlow / a leading alternative-energy or cleantech startup

Panelists (Diaspora/Global Expert): Dr. Shamsul Arefin, Assistant Professor, Renewable Energy, Sunny Morris Valley (Taxes Tech University) 

CONTEXT & BACKGROUND

Renewables supply less than 6 percent of Bangladesh's roughly 29,000+ MW installed generation capacity (SREDA / BPDB), even as domestic gas fields deplete and imported fuel exposes the economy to price shocks. The country's clean-energy credentials are nonetheless real: more than six million solar home systems - the largest off-grid solar programme in the world (IDCOL / World Bank) - brought power to millions before the grid arrived, and national plans target around 30 percent of electricity from clean sources by 2040 (Invest Bangladesh Authority). Bridging today's fossil-heavy reality and tomorrow's targets will demand innovation across solar, LNG as a transition fuel, biogas, storage, and industrial efficiency - plus bankable models to finance it all.

SYNOPSIS

Energy innovation is essential for industrial competitiveness, energy security and greener growth. Aligned with the core agenda, this plenary concentrates on innovation in alternative energy sources - solar at utility, rooftop and distributed scale; LNG as a transition fuel; and biogas and waste-to-energy for rural and agro-industrial Bangladesh - alongside storage, smart grids and efficiency. Public energy institutions, development partners, manufacturers, financiers and cleantech innovators will examine how promising technologies become bankable projects in real operating environments, and what grid, standards, procurement and financing conditions deployment requires.

OBJECTIVE OF THE SESSION

Identify practical innovations across solar, LNG, biogas and other alternative energy sources - and define the policy, finance, grid-integration and partnership conditions required to scale them for industry, communities and national growth.