At the first Clean Energy Ministerial last month, the participating countries—which produce 80 percent of the world’s greenhouse gas emissions—sought ways to bring “transformational change” to energy usage. Although not their original intent, the 11 initiatives they signed could potentially provide the best Plan B approach to succeed the Kyoto Protocol.

Background on the Ministerial

The ministerial—held in Washington—owes its origins to President Barack Obama’s call in March 2009 for a Major Economies Forum on Energy and Climate, composed of the 17 countries with the world’s largest economies. Forum leaders met in July 2009 in L’Aquila, Italy, as a sidebar to the G8 Summit. The goal was to find common ground on energy issues going into last December’s meeting in Copenhagen, scheduled to agree on a successor to the Kyoto Protocol—the international agreement to reduce greenhouse gas emissions drafted in 1997, which came into force in 2005.  

Copenhagen proved a calamity when no new climate plan materialized. The Forum countries huddled on the sidelines. They had little immediate use for the 10 Technology Action Plans (TAPs) that they had prepared, which show how to make significant reductions in greenhouse gas emissions. The plans summarize savings potential, highlighted best practices, and identified specific actions to improve energy efficiency and usage. To salvage their efforts, U.S. Energy Secretary Steven Chu invited his energy Forum counterparts and other willing allies—24 countries in all—to the ministerial.  

When the ministerial met last month, it not only built on the forum’s work but also adopted its tone. There were no assertions that the developed economies caused the climate change problem and should pay for the solution. There were also no countercharges that greenhouse gases from rapidly developing countries are increasing too quickly and must be capped. Instead, the representatives of developed and developing countries alike talked about how they planned to partner on energy solutions.

Members of the ministerial agreed to eleven initiatives that range from implementing electricity smart grids to providing off-grid appliances for the world’s poor. These plans—and the discussions that took place at the ministerial—have the potential to refocus and salvage the energy debate going forward.

Clean Energy Initiatives

The initiatives agreed to by the ministerial affect everything from energy sources, energy uses, and energy prices, to energy reliability, energy access, and climate change. The central provision of the Kyoto Protocol and any successor are caps on the greenhouse gas emissions of one group of countries—the largest historic emitters under Kyoto and hopefully the largest current emitters under any successor, including China and other rapidly developing countries, which were not included under Kyoto. The protocol allows countries that exceed their assigned amounts to buy emission units from those countries under their designated amounts. A “Plan B” would achieve a similar reduction in aggregate emissions through a portfolio of international energy saving and emission reduction measures. 

The ministerial initiatives also go beyond Kyoto’s cap-and-trade focus on the largest emitters to include a broader view of environmental and social impacts. 

One initiative calls for ensuring regular energy access to the poor. Currently, 1.6 billion people throughout the world lack access to grid electricity, leaving them without electricity for essentials such as lighting and refrigeration. By providing them with solar LED lights—instead of oil-based kerosene lanterns—the ministerial countries hope to provide lighting for 10 million people within five years, extending a successful India program to other countries. 

The smart grid initiative will apply advanced information technologies to electricity generation, transmission and distribution, and end-uses, providing an information tool to improve energy efficiency and facilitate the increased use of renewable energy sources. This initiative calls for governments to communicate at high levels about the issue, share best practices, offer technical assistance and peer review, and coordinate projects. Doing so will allow consumers and businesses to get a better handle on their own usage, detail ways to improve existing systems, and suggest how to develop electric vehicles that reduce reliance on fuel.

Another initiative seeks to inventory a river basin in a representative African country for potential hydropower resources that can be used. The ministerial will also look for organizations to provide funding for future hydropower investment. Its objective is to provide a model for the use of run-of-river and low-head hydropower stations that minimize the adverse impacts of relocating families whose homes are flooded by large hydropower reservoirs.  

One initiative with a huge potential for energy and climate savings is the Super-efficient Equipment and Appliance Deployment (SEAD) program. Chu gave a persuasive example of increasing the use of energy-efficient appliances. He pointed to a 75 percent reduction in the energy use of refrigerators through advanced energy-saving technologies—even as the cost of the appliances was cut in half.

Another capacity building initiative will create Clean Energy Solution Centers to help governments in developing countries develop and adopt low-carbon technologies. The centers will identify and share best-practice policies, provide information on emerging policy trends, and create opportunities for policy coordination among countries.  

The ministerial also addressed the support needed to implement clean energy, including an initiative to increasing the role and number of women in developing energy programs. Women currently comprise just 20 percent of the professional energy workforce. U.S. Energy Undersecretary Kristina Johnson will spearhead the international effort to increase the number of women pursuing clean energy careers.

Carrying out the Initiatives

In tough economic times, national spending on energy initiatives is spotty and often declines. But increased, targeted, and informed technology spending and collaboration by countries—particularly in the areas of research, development, and demonstration (RD&D)—will be needed to carry out the initiatives successfully.

Governments can also influence new technology developments through policy changes, as several examples cited at the ministerial demonstrate.

For example, the India lighting replacement program, mentioned above, is seeking to change all of the country’s light bulbs from incandescent to compact fluorescent lamp (CFL) in the next two years. The government is providing tax credits for companies that supply the more efficient bulbs. Moving from an incandescent bulb—which produces ten lumens per watt—to a CFL—which produces 70 lumens per watt—to even a light-emitting diode (LED)—which produces 100 lumens per watt—provides a potential ten-fold increase in efficiency and reduces the amount of energy needed.

Setting clear standards and goals is also important in executing initiatives. Faced with a large, disintegrated auto industry ten years ago, China began considering automobile efficiency and air pollution standards. Once it developed and put those standards in place, the auto industry became much more organized and responsive to government regulations, and foreign car companies could no longer sell their old, polluting technologies to China.

Limits of the Ministerial

Some of the topics addressed by the Major Economies Forum last year were unfortunately not covered in the ministerial. For example, while the forum sought to address the future of energy use in transportation, the initiative covered only ways to increase the number of electric vehicles on the roads.

Although electric vehicles play an important role in reducing greenhouse gas emissions, their carbon footprint includes the amount of coal used to generate the electricity. Other factors to consider in transportation are biofuel options, vehicle costs, down-sized vehicles, mass transit, and land use planning.

Similarly, the ministerial has overlooked the largest opportunities for energy savings in the buildings sector—residential buildings. The TAPs produced two plans: one for the residential buildings, the other for all other commercial and public buildings. The only incentive to emerge skimmed off the largest commercial buildings and combined them with the industrial sector. Admittedly, industrial buildings account for up to 60 percent of global energy use, but the initiative forgets the energy we use at home, a serious oversight at a time of increased urbanization. This initiative needs to be fixed. 

In addition, transforming the use of coal must go beyond carbon capture, use, and storage. One of the TAPs—which received limited attention at the ministerial—described the need to close down or renovate existing coal-fired plants, expand waste heat recovery, and explore the potential of integrated coal gasification combined cycle and other advanced technologies. The ministerial would be wise to follow that lead.

Finally, the ministerial should keep in mind that renewable energy sources should not be treated as competing options as reflected in the various initiatives for different renewable sources. The objective of using renewable technologies should be to optimize the mix of renewable resources, determine the potential of all available renewables in a studied geographical area, make transparent analyses of the cost of their delivered energy using the latest technologies, compile the results into a robust plan that optimizes the mix of renewables, and overlay political boundaries on the results to identify opportunities for multi-country and multi-regional initiatives. Marine energy—including offshore wind, tidal streams, wave energy, and thermal conversion—and geothermal energy should also be part of the renewables mix.

Going Forward

Despite good intentions, the track record for high-profile energy events like the ministerial is not reassuring. Senior officials return home to face more pressing national issues. Funding for projects is limited and researchers focus on their current work rather than investing time in new efforts.

This meeting showed some signs of being different. Several of the initiatives—including the SEAD program, the large buildings and industry efficiency project, and the creation of Clean Energy Solutions Centers—offer an encouraging level of detail. The United States and Italy have pledged funding for the grid electricity project, for example, showing their intent to follow through on the project. Other plans link government, corporate, and foundations in developing solutions, a promising innovation.

The countries joining the forum also signal that times may be changing. They include the United Arab Emirates, a member of the Organization of Petroleum Export Countries (OPEC)—whose 1973 oil embargo awakened the world to its energy limits. Now an OPEC country is not only joining global clean energy leaders, but will host the second ministerial meeting next April in Abu Dhabi.

For the ministerial to achieve lasting change, the participating countries will need to maintain their commitment to reducing energy usage, despite national concerns and the disagreements that have stalled other discussions. They will also need to communicate frequently between and during meetings to ensure promises are kept and progress is made. Otherwise, these countries will likely be headed back to the energy drawing board once again.