IUCN and CREEI launch new project to advance sustainable renewable energy systems

The meeting brought together representatives from government, industry, academia, and international organisations to discuss how renewable energy development can better integrate biodiversity conservation, climate action, and sustainable development. Building on the memorandum of understanding signed by IUCN and CREEI in January 2025, the project will strengthen co-operation at the intersection of renewable energy and nature through joint research, technical exchange, and international engagement.

As countries expand renewable energy to meet global climate goals, ensuring that this transition also safeguards biodiversity and benefits local communities is increasingly important. By combining IUCN's conservation science and policy expertise with CREEI's leading capacity and experience in renewable energy planning and engineering, the collaboration seeks to develop practical, evidence-based approaches that support renewable energy systems which are environmentally sustainable, socially inclusive, and climate resilient.

“The energy transition must move at the speed the climate crisis demands, but it must also be designed with nature at its core. Hydropower will remain an important part of renewable energy systems, especially as countries integrate more wind and solar power. This cooperation between IUCN and CREEI can help ensure that hydropower development protects freshwater ecosystems, supports communities, and contributes to a genuinely nature-positive energy future,” said Stewart Maginnis, Deputy Director General of IUCN.

The joint initiative will focus on two flagship research streams that will underpin the collaboration.

1. Defining sustainable renewable energy systems
   • The first stream will define and operationalise sustainable and sustainable renewable energy systems. It will co-develop a shared framework, principles, criteria, and practical methodologies for renewable energy planning and decision-making, grounded in four integrated dimensions: ecological integrity, social equity and benefits, robust governance, and climate performance. The work will help clarify what nature-positive renewable energy means in practice across planning, siting, design, operation, monitoring, and decommissioning, so that renewable energy expansion can contribute to climate mitigation while avoiding, minimising, and restoring impacts on biodiversity, ecosystems, livelihoods, and rights.
2. Strengthening biodiversity safeguards for hydropower
   • The second stream will investigate the guidance for environmental impact assessment and biodiversity safeguards in hydropower and associated infrastructure. Building on international evidence, existing sustainability standards and applied experience, the work will address project-level environmental impact assessment and environmental and social impact assessment, strategic environmental assessment, cumulative impact assessment, and lifecycle mitigation across dams, reservoirs, diversion systems, transmission lines, and access roads. It will focus on key impact domains such as freshwater ecosystems, migratory species and ecological connectivity, and translate these into practical tools for environmental flows, fish passage, habitat restoration, monitoring, and adaptive management.

Beyond joint research, the partnership will produce a package of knowledge and policy outputs tailored to different audiences, including a framing or discussion paper on sustainable renewable energy systems, technical briefs on methodologies and implementation pathways, a hydropower technical guidance document, and a policy paper with recommendations for regulators and operators on planning, mitigation, and monitoring requirements. These outputs will be supported by expert review and consultation, technical exchange, workshops and outreach activities, helping policymakers, regulators, developers, operators, financiers and conservation practitioners apply science-based approaches in renewable energy planning and implementation.

Over the coming months, IUCN and CREEI will refine the research frameworks, undertake review and gap analysis, co-develop assessment methodologies, validate draft outputs with experts and stakeholders, and prepare the final publications and outreach package. The collaboration will also continue engaging Chinese and international experts through working meetings, workshops, roundtables, and global policy platforms, including the Rio Conventions, the IUCN World Protected and Conserved Areas Congress, the IRENA Assembly, and other global events, with the aim of turning the two research streams into practical guidance that supports sustainable renewable energy systems and more sustainable hydropower pathways.

The initiative comes at a time when hydropower development faces growing environmental and climate-related challenges. At the launch, representatives highlighted the importance of basin-wide co-ordination, ecological connectivity, stronger monitoring, and adaptive management, and whole-lifecycle approaches to ecological protection.

ZHAO Xin, Deputy Director General, Department of Environmental Impact Assessment and Emission Management, Ministry of Ecology and Environment of China, noted that China has consistently followed a hydropower development approach that prioritises ecological conservation and green development, promoting a shift in hydropower environmental protection from individual engineering measures towards integrated river-basin governance.

He outlined four priorities for future work. First, to remain committed to green development and promote closer integration between hydropower development and ecological conservation. Second, to strengthen basin-wide protection by co-ordinating environmental management across upstream and downstream areas, both riverbanks, and main streams and tributaries, while restoring riverine ecological connectivity. Third, to improve the effectiveness of ecological protection by strengthening technical standards and guidelines, enhancing the monitoring and evaluation of protection measures, and accelerating research and technological innovation in areas such as artificial propagation of key fish species. Fourth, to build broader support for ecological and environmental protection through extensive public outreach and education and by continuously raising public awareness of ecological conservation. Zhao Xin expressed China's willingness to strengthen exchanges of experience, promote the sharing of standards, and deepen cooperation on capacity building with all parties, with a view to jointly advancing ecological and environmental protection in the global hydropower sector.

ZHAO Zenghai, Deputy Director General of CREEI, introduced the achievements of hydropower development in China over the past five years, including further progress in establishing a high-quality hydropower development framework, strengthening hydropower’s role in peak-load supply, and broadening the scope of green hydropower development. He noted that hydropower development is facing growing environmental and climate-related challenges, including increasingly stringent ecological protection requirements, greater variability in water inflows and extreme weather events, and the need to balance hydropower development with the overall benefits of river basins and ecosystems. He emphasised the need to strengthen basin-wide co-ordination and whole-lifecycle ecological management, improve environmental monitoring and adaptive management, and enhance the effectiveness of ecological protection measures.

For more news and technical articles from the global renewable industry, read the latest issue of Energy Global magazine.

Energy Global’s Summer 2026 issue

The Summer issue of 2026 is out now! The new issue starts with a regional report on Latin America and the Caribbean, considering the benefits and challenges of renewable energy development in the region. The issue also covers topics such as lubricants, digitalisation, the importance of ports, battery storage technology, and more! With contributors from industry leaders including ABB, WindEurope, Sungrow, among others, this is an issue not to miss.

Read the article online at: https://www.energyglobal.com/other-renewables/21082026/iucn-and-creei-launch-new-project-to-advance-sustainable-renewable-energy-systems/