Türkiye is aiming for a 77% share of renewables in its installed electricity capacity by 2040 under an energy vision published ahead of the COP31 UN climate talks starting today.
Türkiye, which is hosting the summit, outlined plans to boost its electricity capacity from 123GW in 2025 to 281GW by 2040, with renewables rising as a share of the total from 63% to 77% at an estimated cost of US$190 billion.
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Under the plan, solar capacity would increase from 26GW today to 112GW by 2040.
Unveiling the National Energy 2040 plan, Turkish energy minister Alparslan Bayraktar said: “In 2040, in the Turkish Century, our goal is to make Türkiye energy independent.” He added that Türkiye would now electrify its economy, reaching a 36% electrification rate by 2040.”
Minister Bayraktar said the country would reach the 281GW target through annual tenders for at least 2GW of renewable energy sources, 6GW of offshore wind power plants, international projects, capacity increases and renovations and the addition of hybrid capacities to existing power plants. Smaller projects with a capacity of less than one megawatt would also be encouraged, he said.
“Wars and crises have shown that distributed production has become vital. That is, local production and local consumption,” Bayraktar said. “In wars, energy infrastructures become the primary targets. Distributing production also has a strategic significance. We aim to establish smaller power plants under one megawatt more intensively.”
Flexibility and storage are also key elements of the plan, both fundamental to absorb the volume of variable generation capacity anticipated by 2040.
“Turkey needs 140 gigawatt-hours of storage,” Bayraktar said. “We aim to increase our interconnection capacity from 5.4GW to 15GW. We are increasing our capacities with Syria and Iraq. Türkiye needs a 6GW pumped-storage hydroelectric power plant. One of our most important flexibility items will be electric transportation. We say that in 2040, 147 out of every 1,000 people in Türkiye will own an electric vehicle. Turkey will have a fleet of 20 million electric and hybrid vehicles. We predict that almost half of the total 41 million vehicle stock will be electric.”
