According to a plan released by the Iraqi National Investment Bureau this week, Iraq will strive to achieve 12GW solar energy system installation capacity by 2030.

In a statement, Rahimal Jaafari, a consultant of the State Investment Bureau, said that the State Investment Agency is issuing an investment license and will begin production capacity construction.

Al Jaafari added that the Ministerial Meeting has allocated about 7.5GW capacity from each company, and the government has taken important measures to distribute the remaining capacity. The government did not mention the specific situation of any company or project in the announcement.

This new plan was based on the 10GW target proposed by the Iraqi government in 2021 to achieve the 10GW target by 2030. The goal proposed by the plan is to strive to use solar energy to meet 20% of the power demand of Iraq at the end of this decade.

According to data from Irena, Iraq's new solar photovoltaic capacity in 2022 is only 5MW. Photovoltaic technology accounts for only 3% of its total renewable energy installed capacity, and 97% of renewable energy comes from hydraulic/ocean energy.

AJ Jaafari said that as a member of the Paris Agreement, Iraq is obliged to reduce emissions and increase the use of renewable energy. As part of the same framework, the Iraqi government is committed to developing waste-energy transformation technology.

Despite rich solar radiation resources, Iraq has not yet become a solar photovoltaic power generation market. A major progress last year was that the French energy giant Totalenergies decided to restart a 1GW photovoltaic power generation agreement with the Iraqi government.