A Turkish industry group has drawn up a comprehensive energy strategy for the country, focusing primarily on a transition from conventional sources to clean and renewable ones.
The 11-point plan is based on three main principles – producing and consuming domestic, efficient and technology-oriented energy; establishing a vibrant Turkish energy industry; and making Turkey an energy-independent country, according to the Independent Industrialists and Businessmen Association (MÜSIAD).
"Turkey is on the way to becoming an important energy center with its unique geopolitical position in the world and new energy policies,” Mahmut Asmalı, chairperson of MÜSIAD, said at an event in Istanbul late Friday.
Altuğ Karataş, head of MÜSIAD’s energy and environment council, said the group aims to contribute to Turkey’s push for energy self-sufficiency.
"We are seeing the start of a great transformation in energy. In this, there will be those who keep up with the changes and those who do not,” he said.
Turkey is one of the countries least affected by the prevalent global energy crisis, he said, emphasizing that the "transformation offers great opportunities” for the country.
"Our nation has the knowledge and expertise, coupled with our strategic location, to turn this crisis into an opportunity,” he said.
Turkey, he said, has already shown its capabilities, going from a country that needed help from others to utilize its own energy resources, to one that has its own companies, trains its own engineers and carries out exploration missions with its own ships.
Turkey is now producing its own clean energy, which is the main focus of the business world and its future investment strategies, Karataş added.
The MÜSIAD plan aims to raise the share of renewable energy in Turkey’s electricity production to 75% by 2050, along with a 3% share in the global renewable energy market, and an increase in the share of nuclear energy to 20% in the next 20 years.
It calls for the complete removal of bureaucratic hurdles hindering renewable energy investments; a national energy efficiency drive with $20 billion (TL 318.08 billion) in financing for investments over the next 10 years; and a target of reducing spending on energy imports by $40 billion.
The plan envisions a greater focus on production through renewable and low-carbon gases, an energy industry strategy to support domestic and national energy policies, and collaborative efforts for the development of domestic technologies.
It emphasizes the need for Turkey to push up hydrogen exports to $5 billion per year in the next 20 years, as well as increase oil and gas pipelines passing through its territory to become a stable energy supplier.
The plan calls for raising a qualified workforce for 200,000 new jobs to be created through the energy transformation drive over the coming 10 years.
It also stresses the need for legislation to slash dependence on external energy sources, promote energy conservation and domestic production of electric vehicles and battery technologies.
