Brussels Energy Club engages in high-level discussions at the Azerbaijan Diplomatic Academy (ADA Policy Forum), April 7-10

The 7th ADA University Policy Forum, titled “Facing the New World Order,” took place from April 7 to 10, 2025, in Baku and Khankendi, Azerbaijan. Over 80 participants from 44 countries, including renowned policymakers, scholars, and experts from leading think tanks and academic institutions, attended the forum.

During the ADA Forum, Dr Marat Terterov, a Brussels Energy Club expert, stated that:

• While Azerbaijan is largely dependent on revenues generated by sales of oil and gas to international consumers, the country is making a policy shift towards renewables

• Azerbaijan entertains a balanced energy policy: mainstay fossil fuels with a gradual phase out and longer-term objectives of decarbonisation, investment into wind and solar, as well as energy efficiency

• Azerbaijan's energy strategy is becoming akin to that of the UAE, or other Gulf States - high dependence on exports of hydrocarbons, whilst diversifying towards renewables

• Azerbaijan is liberalising its power market in order to stimulate electricity trading with neighbouring countries and to connect its autonomous region of Nakhichivan with Azerbaijan proper

• Power market liberalisation in Azerbaijan will lead to high-voltage grid expansion, diversifying dependence on the country's Mingachevir-Obsheron high-voltage power line, and a greater openness to foreign investment

• New generation capacity based on wind and or solar will also allow Azerbaijan to free up more gas for export to the EU and Turkey, rather than feeding it into the country's mainstay Mingachevir power plant

• Close to 90% of Azerbaijan's electricity generation capacity is powered by gas, although the government intends to reduce this figure as the country transitions towards renewables

Watch the recording of the high-level meeting with H.E. Ilham Aliyev, President of the Republic of Azerbaijan, held on April 9, 2025, within the Forum:

Click here to view the full transcript of the high-level meeting.

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