TWRE: Turkish Women in Renewables and Energy - Enablers of Gender Equality in Energy Transition of Turkey.
Sustainability is crucial for the future of the world and energy transition has an important role in it.
To be able to achieve a sustainable future men and women has to be equal.
Turkish Women in Renewables and Energy Network to build up to furnish equality in the energy sector.
The founding president Sedef Budak has 20 years of Professional carrier and yet 13 years was full filled with renewables.
She started as a woman entrepreneur back in 2007 to import wind energy generators, solar modules, inverters, gas turbines from Far East.
During the following years she has decided to transit her carrier path in to the consultancy services and become exclusive partner of Windfor S.r.l. which is the well-known Italian independent technical consultant company active in wind and solar energy projects since 2004. The company is now part of Vector Cuatro Group under Falck Renewables.
Ms. Budak has touched and worked over 12 GW energy project in Turkey.
She had the idea and will to bring women in the industry together to create a synergy to power up and support each other since the begging of her carrier.
Therefore she founded the TWRE network back in 2018 with the mission of:
The vision is to contribute to gender equality in the professional life,
To empower women and assure women will reach up decision making positions.
With about 1250 members on line the network is become the biggest platform in energy sector of Turkey.
Before Covid-19, the group participated 60 different events in Turkey and abroad.
Set up the first women’s sail team and participating the national sailing races.
Invited by Women in Energy Symposium in the United States to present Turkey.
One of the first members of GWNET Global Network for Energy Transition, German Energy
Agency DENA shows TWRE as a model for other women’s platforms worldwide.
TWRE is also global partner of IEEE’s Women in Engineering Project and supporter of the Global Wind Energy Council Women in Wind Leadership program since 2019.
As a recognised initiative by UNWOMEN in Turkey, TWRE making a difference in transition of energy with a group of strong people developing ideas and projects for the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals: SDG 4 Quality Education, SDG 5 Gender Equality, SDG 7 Affordable and Clean Energy, SDG 8 Decent Work and Economic Growth, SDG 10 Reduced Inequalities, SDG 11 Sustainable Cities, SDG 12 Responsible Consumption and Production, SDG 13 Climate Action and SDG 17 Partnership for the Goals.
Enhanced the visibility and strengthened the presence of the women in energy transition by designing TWRE Special Sessions in the fairs and congresses.
Furthermore, the group use of the COVID-19 period very beneficial with online projects.
TWRE brought the audience together with experts and famous figures in 25 Webinar sessions during our so called GREEN CALLS Series, on various topics from energy investment to digital transformation, funding, green policies, employment and blockchain etc. from April 2020 to June 2020. We have made these webinars available to public audience on our Youtube Channel.
The group continues to learn from experts and academics about Wind, Solar, Biomass, Geothermal Power, E-mobility, Energy Funding, Energy Law, Energy Efficiency, Green Buildings and Energy Efficiency Standards in our courses 101, 102, 201 and 202 at undergraduate and graduate level in our ongoing project called GREEN CLASSES that launched in June 2020.
TWRE Recently started Woman to Woman (W2W) Mentorship Program and Gender Equality and Inclusion Report studies to provide human resource directions .
Once looking in to recent figures of Turkish power and energy sector the total Installed capacity is reached up to 92.884,5 MW.
The breakdown of the main resources are:
32,04 % Hydro, 27,57% Natural Gas, 20,52% Coal, 8,57 % Wind, 6,70 % Solar , 1,25 %
Geothermal power. Today Turkey has 7965 MW Wind Energy Power Plant in operation and
6232 MW Solar Energy Power Plant in operation. (figures provided from TEAİŞ, June 2020)
The government continues to allocate Renewable Energy Resource Areas (YEKA) and licence tenders. Policy makers announced their implementation with intended National Contribution of Energy shall be 10 GW of Solar, 16 GW of Wind by 2030 as well as
Utilization of all possible hydraulic capacity.
In addition 1 nuclear power plant will be commissioned by 2030 we are also working for the energy digitalization, transition, carbon reduction and dissemination of decentralization, cogeneration and micro-cogeneration Systems in to the grid.
Turkey recently finds natural gas reserve of 320 billion cubic metres off Black Sea and government ultimate aim to become a net energy exporter.
Considering all executed capacities by different disciplines men and women the energy transition is a promising sector which deserves to be gender equal.
The group can be followed by:
https://www.instagram.com/Greencollarwomen/
https://twitter.com/TWRE_Official
https://www.linkedin.com/company/twre/
https://www.facebook.com/twreofficial
http://youtube.com/TurkishWomeninRenewablesandEnergy
* Sedef Budak is the Founder President of TWRE
4 September 2020
TWRE
