The man who is considered the founder of the International Renewable Energy Agency (Irena), which has its headquarters in Abu Dhabi, has died.
Hermann Scheer, a member of the German parliament and the general chairman of the World Council for Renewable Energy, passed away in Berlin on Thursday at age 66. He was also president of the European Association for Renewable Energy.
Scheer was a driving force in the founding of Irena last year. The organisation helps 149 members in 39 countries to define their renewable energy strategies.
The agency will be permanently headquartered in Masdar City once that project is completed.
Scheer opened the International Solar Energy Society's Solar World Congress in Johannesburg last year, and in 2002 was recognised by Time magazine as one of five "Heroes for the Green Century". He has also won the Alternative Nobel Prize for promoting solar energy.
"Hermann is the father of Irena, he is an inspiring model," Hélène Pelosse, the organisation's interim director general, said. "In his speech during the founding conference on Irena, Hermann reminded us that we shouldn't lose any more time to accelerate the transition towards renewable energies."
Scheer wrote five books and more than 1,000 articles demonstrating the necessity and feasibility of a transition from fossil and nuclear resources to fields of renewable energy.
