Turkey Launches 35-by-35 Electrification Pledge at UN as Bangladesh Cuts Solar Import Taxes
The COP31 presidency's new electrification target and Bangladesh's solar tax cuts signal tightening policy pressure on fossil fuel demand across developing Asia.
Turkey's COP31 president-designate Murat Kurum unveiled the "35-by-35 Global Electrification Pledge" at UN Headquarters on Monday (2026-09-21), setting a collective ambition to raise electricity's share of global final energy demand from roughly 23% to 35% by 2035. The pledge came as world leaders gathered at the UN General Assembly during the week of 2026-09-21, making it one of the more consequential climate-linked demand signals to emerge from New York this year.5,4
Getting from 23% to 35% in nine years would require moving roughly four times faster than the current pace of electrification, according to energytracker.asia analysis. IRENA has separately said electricity's share needs to reach around 30% by 2030 just to stay on a Paris-aligned trajectory — an interim milestone that itself implies a pace the world has not yet demonstrated.5,3
Kurum framed the pledge around energy security as much as climate. Energyvoice reported him citing "a warming world, a global energy system in disarray, and growing fears" as the context for the push. Turkey has linked the electrification goal to fossil fuel cost pressures that have intensified since the Iran energy shock, and the country intends to make the target a flagship priority at the COP31 summit in Antalya in November, according to eenews.net.4,2
The pledge includes a parallel commitment to cut energy intensity in buildings by 25% by 2035 through electrification measures, energyvoice reported. For utilities and grid developers, that granularity sharpens the investment case: building electrification implies a faster ramp in heat pump deployment and associated peak load growth, which in turn drives demand for flexible generation and storage capacity.4
The investment gap behind the target is stark. IRENA data cited by energytracker.asia show annual transmission investment would need to rise from roughly USD 500 billion to USD 1.2 trillion and hold at that level across the 2026-2035 period. Installed renewable capacity would need to expand well beyond the 5,149 GW recorded in 2025.3 At COP29, governments backed mobilising at least USD 300 billion a year by 2035 for developing-country energy action — a sum that sits well below what IRENA says the grid build alone requires.1
Ember data offer one reason for optimism: over 70% of the energy system can already be electrified using commercially available technologies, a threshold Ember says was not achievable five years ago. Countries including Iceland, Norway and Bahrain have already crossed the 35% electrification mark. But those are small economies with specific resource advantages. Scaling the same outcome across South and Southeast Asia is a different exercise entirely.3
Bangladesh made that point directly at UNGA. Government representatives highlighted the country's dependence on affordable solar equipment, and the policy response has been rapid. In September 2026, Bangladesh's National Board of Revenue reduced the tax burden on solar equipment imports to 1% for commercial importers. Those levies had previously totalled 17% and reached as high as 58.6% for some equipment categories — a structure that had made grid-scale procurement expensive relative to peer markets.5
Dhaka has also established a USD 122.42 million fund, sourced at BDK 15 billion, to provide low-cost loans for household, institutional and industrial solar installations. IRENA estimated that renewable generation avoided USD 480 billion in fossil fuel costs globally in 2025, and Bangladesh's finance ministry appears to have weighed that arithmetic when structuring the fund.5
The Australian government has also endorsed the 35-by-35 framework. Energy minister Chris Bowen announced support for the target at the UN's interim climate talks in Bonn in June 2026, and Australia co-organized COP31 preparations with Turkey, according to reneweconomy.com.au. The IEA and IRENA both provided analytical underpinning for the pledge.1
Analysts note that the target is explicitly framed as a global aspiration rather than a uniform national obligation. Energytracker.asia cited expert commentary arguing that individually tailored transition pathways aligned with global ambition are more practical than a single universal electrification rate. For developing economies with constrained fiscal space, that framing preserves flexibility — but it also creates room for ambiguity when assessing how much demand destruction for fossil fuels the pledge actually implies.3,5
The concrete test arrives in Antalya in November. Whether governments formally inscribe the 35-by-35 target in COP31 outcomes and attach finance commitments sufficient to close the IRENA-estimated investment gap are the questions that energy markets are pricing against Monday's (2026-09-21) announcement. The gap between the USD 300 billion mobilised at COP29 and the USD 1.2 trillion annual transmission need IRENA puts on the table is not a rounding error.2,1,3