Australia's Bilateral and Multilateral Partnership With South Asian Nations

Abstract

This chapter aims to investigate the potential cooperation between Australia and the SAARC nations to facilitate generation and distribution of energy to better manage this sector and fulfil their commitments towards climate change conditions. As carbon emissions from non-renewables severely threatened the climate conditions, an effective transition to renewable resources is essential. In the Paris Agreement, Australia and SAARC nations committed to reduce their individual carbon emissions. But the SAARC lag in their commitments as they fail to unleash renewables and rely on fossil fuel. Australia leads in renewables, and SAARC provides a large market for it to relate services and technologies and improve energy efficiency and competitiveness. This chapter investigates the opportunities for strategic collaboration between these nations; challenges of energy trading, energy security, inefficient institutions, volatile prices and investment flows, collaborative capacity generation and distribution; and analyses comparative advantages for the countries to have mutually beneficial agreements to meet UNSDGs of affordable clean energy and climate action.