In spite of about two years of doubts about its take-off, the International Solar Alliance (ISA) has formerly become a reality with 46 countries signing off its statute, and 19 of them already ratifying it.

Dubbed the alliance of sunshine countries, the ISA has up to 121 member countries, and is championed by India and France. It came into effect on Wednesday, with an objective to promote affordable sun-powered electricity to its members using global tenders and cheap financing.

With 19 countries’ ratification and 46 signatories to its framework agreement, the ISA plans to mobilize $1 trillion of low-cost financing for solar energy by 2030.

Its interim director general, Upendra Tripathy, was quoted by Bloomberg to have said in an interview in New Delhi, that, “There is no shortage of capital as trillions of dollars are lying in big funds and our program seeks to help divert this into renewable energy.”

Tripathy, equally explained that the ISA was exploring green bonds for renewable energy projects and raising money in local currencies to remove hedging risks.

Expectedly, solar power projects in tropical countries could get a big push with the realisation of ISA which Indian Prime Minister, Narendra Modi and then French President, François Hollande, launched in Paris in 2015.

The ISA would also bring its 121 tropical countries together to boost large-scale deployment of solar power in them. Most of the countries in the tropical belt are either underdeveloped or at a developing stage, and could rely on solar power to improve access to sustainable energy.

The alliance would also hope to expedite its main programmes and the goals of aggregating demand for solar technologies, finance, innovation, research and development and capacity building.