At Rio+20, considering the objectives of SE4All, the Government of Brazil committed itself to provide renewable and clean sources of energy, in its energy mix throughout the production of energy from bio fuels, hydroelectricity, biomass, wind and solar in order to promote economic development of the country, with environmental protection and social inclusion.

Since then, the Government has contracted, through its public auction system, 17,780 MW of new generation capacity. 72.4% of this new generation capacity consists of renewable sources and contracts over 42,000 km of new transmission lines, which are under implementation. The investment in renewable energy sources, including the associated transmission network, reaches R$ 75.6 billion (US$ 33.7 billion), accounting for 25.3% of the Brazilian commitment to invest in electrical energy in a 10-year period.

The Light for All Program has ensured access to 15.5 million people with investments of around R$ 22.7 billion (US$ 11.0 billion) allowing Brazil to ensure access to electricity for 99.4% of its population. For the period of 2015-2018 the program will bring energy to an additional 1 million people, including 100,000 located in remote regions of the Brazilian Amazon. This goal will be met with clean and renewable energy sources, mainly solar, with planned investments of US$ 1 billion. This program has also led the inclusion of over 250 thousand women into economic activities.

In 2014 the first public auction for the purchase of solar power connected to the grid was held and 890 MW were purchased at one of the lowest prices in the world. Brazil is definitely committed to increasing the penetration of solar energy in their electricity mix. In this regard, province tax exemptions were recently approved for micro and mini distributed generation. Later this year, another program is going to be launched to foster distributed solar generation and two new public auctions are scheduled for solar power plants connected to the grid.

Regarding energy efficiency, Brazil has been implementing actions in order to achieve a total energy saving of 9% by 2030, comprising 10 % in the energy sector and 12% in the transport sector. The Brazilian government has just launched a program for energy efficiency in the federal public buildings and a comprehensive guide for facilitating energy efficiency measures in public buildings.

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