SUNRISE Biannual Symposium February 2022
Transitioning to Net Zero: Water, Energy, and Food Nexus
SUNRISE is an international network to address global energy poverty through developing and deploying advanced solar energy technologies.
In 2017, 840 million people globally lacked access to electricity. In rural India, millions of households continue to struggle with an unaffordable and unreliable energy supply, even where the grid is accessible. Widespread use of alternative energy sources such as kerosene and biomass have numerous health risks to populations across the world.
Over the last decade, while traditional silicon solar panels have become quite cost effective, recent advancements in a third-generation solar technology offer an affordable and technologically superior solution, using low-cost, earth-abundant, sustainable materials with a low upfront cost manufacturing or CAPEX advantage. This technology is known as the perovskite-silicon tandem solar cell.
The SUNRISE network aims to accelerate the development, integration, and adoption of perovskites and other renewable technologies by uniting experts from the UK, India, Mexico, South Africa and Kazakhstan. This network continues longstanding bilateral partnerships in education, research, and innovation, and connects several relevant major investments from India and the UK, including the flagship UKRI-DST programmes APEX I and APEX II.
Essential to the project’s success is the involvement of several disciplines, from physics and engineering to social sciences. We also work with industrial partners such as Tata Cleantech Capital and BIPVco to support the translation of technologies into viable commercial products.
To maintain effective collaborations we have held conferences twice a year since the project’s inception in 2018. This February will be our ninth symposium, and the theme will be ‘Transition to Net Zero.’ Speakers have been invited from across India and the UK in the fields of water and hygiene, food systems, renewable energy, and Net Zero, including Professors Ashok Jhunjhunwala, Howard Griffiths, Henry Snaith, Satish Ogale, and many more. There will also be NGO/industrial representatives speaking such as Pravin Bhagwat (14Trees) and Saurabh Kumar (EESL).
Food, water and energy together makes the foundation for socio-economic development and well-being, but they also significantly contribute towards global warming and climate change, which raises the concern of environmental and ecological sustainability. Food-Water-Energy-Climate Nexus with a transition towards Net Zero will be an effective way to deal with these complicated issues, requiring an interplay of technological interventions, and dedicated efforts of multiple stakeholders including academics, researchers, industries and decision makers. The 9th SUNRISE symposium will explore the links between water and hygiene, energy harvesting, energy systems, food production and food security in the context of decarbonisation and Net Zero through a global collaboration of leading research teams and industries. We look forward to seeing you all on 10th Feb 2022.