Global action on policy and investment is required if progress is to be made on tackling the challenges of poverty and climate change, according to the International Energy Agency (IEA).
Global action on policy and investment is required if progress is to be made on tackling the challenges of poverty and climate change, according to the International Energy Agency (IEA).
The IEA has led a study conducted as part of the UN’s Sustainable Energy for All (SE4ALL) initiative and says that a population four times the size of the USA still lives without access to electricity, while renewable energy accounts for 18 per cent of the global energy mix.
It believes that energy poverty is holding back global economic development. "The IEA has advocated stronger action to tackle energy poverty for more than a decade as part of its World Energy Outlook, but more needs to be done to tackle the problem," said Maria van der Hoeven, IEA Executive Director. "It is a moral imperative and we cannot afford to ignore it."
The IEA study is designed to provide a benchmark for the SE4ALL initiative so that progress towards goals can be tracked and measured. It has identified 20 "high impact" countries that are key to making progress.
It also finds that energy investments need to increase by at least $600 billion per year until 2030 if SE4ALL goals are to be met.
SE4ALL was launched by the UN with three key objectives for 2030: universal access to modern energy services, a doubling in the rate of improvement in energy efficiency, and a doubling of the share of renewable energy in the global energy mix.
"The Sustainable Energy for All initiative is a rallying cry to tackle the twin crises of energy poverty and climate change, and this Global Tracking Framework is an important first response," said van der Hoeven. "By measuring the scale of the challenge, it provides a crucial reference against which the partners of the SE4ALL initiative, and all of us, can track progress towards building a cleaner energy system for all."
The Global Tracking Framework estimates that, as of 2010, 17 per cent of the global population did not have access to electricity while 41 per cent still relied on wood or other biomass to cook and heat their homes. Renewable energy accounted for 18 per cent of the global energy mix in 2010, while global energy efficiency had improved by 1.3 per cent per year on average since 1990.
Countries such as India, China, Bangladesh and Nigeria are included in the list of "high impact" countries that account for around two-thirds of the global electrification deficit and four-fifths of the global deficit in access to non solid fuels.
The IEA has also identified 20 high-income and emerging economy countries, including the USA, China, Russia, India, Japan and Germany, which together account for four-fifths of global energy consumption and where major progress in energy efficiency is required.