The InterDependent

A decade ago, countries in Africa, Asia and Latin America leapfrogged over the West in telecommunications. After years of struggling to install the elaborate infrastructure for landline telephones and cable Internet, the global south is now home to the world's most enthusiastic cellular phone users. Today, many countries in these regions far outstrip the West in mobile technology.

Ten years later, when UN Secretary General Ban Ki-Moon arrived in Abu Dhabi this week for the Future World Energy Summit, he carried a powerful message: it's time for these countries to do the same leapfrogging in energy. Skipping the environmentally costly electricity grids built on fossil fuels, these countries can build up their expertise and infrastructure for renewable energy. Investing in new power capacity will help bring power to the millions worldwide who presently live off the grid, unable to enter the modern economy.

Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon (second from left) speaks with an exhibitor at the 4th World Future Energy Summit’s exhibitions section in Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates. UN Photo/Evan Schneider

“It is not acceptable that 3 billion people...have to rely on wood, coal, charcoal or animal waste for cooking and heating,” Ban said in his keynote address to the summit. The solution, argued the UN secretary general, is to invest massively on clean energy sources in countries currently short on electricity. “We need to turn on the lights for all households. To do that, we need to scale up successful examples of clean energy and energy-efficient technologies.”

At the summit in the capital of the United Arab Emirates, Ban unveiled Sustainable Energy for All, an initiative aimed at putting energy at the top of the policy agenda. Over the coming months and years, the UN will work to mobilize government and private capital, help transfer knowledge among global policymakers and encourage countries to update their grids to the latest technologies.

Sustainable Energy for All sets out three concrete objectives to achieve by 2030: to ensure universal access to modern energy services, to double the rate of improvement in energy efficiency, and to double the share of renewable energy in the global energy mix.

These goals respond to an increasingly stark reality: Macroeconomic growth and poverty reduction depend on access to modern power sources, but safeguarding the planet's health and preventing climate change call for a reduction in the global use of fossil fuels. “Energy is central to everything we do—from powering our economies to achieving the Millennium Development Goals, from combating climate change to underpinning global security,” Ban argued in a keynote speech to the energy summit in Abu Dhabi. “It is the golden thread that connects economic growth, increased social equity and preserving the environment.”

Worldwide, some 1.3 billion people—or 20 percent of the global population—live without electricity. More than 95 percent of those households are in either Africa or developing Asia, according to the International Energy Agency.

This geography is no coincidence, argue those involved in the program. Regions and countries wanting for power also struggle to develop. “You can’t do development—we can’t think about women having access to fuels, kids learning to read—without linking this to energy,” said Tim Wirth, a former U.S. Senator and president of the UN Foundation, in a press conference with journalists. “Energy and development are inextricable.” Yet many of the same developing countries lacking power are also threatened by a future of irregular weather events that could further jeopardize their economic development. Even as they need to generate more power for their populations, fossil fuels will be contributing to environmental peril.

The first goal of the initiative—to get the whole global population on the grid—is perhaps the most difficult, because it is more political than technological. Electrical grids long ago expanded to the many of the most profitable parts of the global economy; it will take new investment—both monetary and political—to reach into the remaining pockets of energy poverty.

The UN initiative acknowledges these challenges, noting in its briefing document, “Policies and politics too often favor the status quo in government and industry.” It plans to reach out to high-level players—in government, industry, and civil society—to build a coalition for change strong enough to challenge that powerful status quo. “We are inviting governments, corporate actors, civil society actors, to make commitments to try to address the needs identified,” explained Robert C. Orr, assistant secretary-general for strategic planning and policy coordination, in the call with journalists. “We think we have the potential to address these issues in a way that a single country of corporation could do.”

Increasing energy efficiency will prove equally important, argues the UN. If countries can use their existing energy supply more intensively, they can avoid building most power plants—which often have environmental consequences. Orr explained, “Energy efficiency over the last 30 years has improved at a rate of about 1.2 percent a year. We need to really double that rate of improvement.”

Finally, the UN hopes to increase renewable energy sources. So-called “green investment” has already grown rapidly in recent years, reaching a high of $260 billion in 2011. The UN will work to boost that even further by encouraging countries to create a positive business environment, says Orr. The secretary general's office has also set up a panel of 40 experts, co-chaired by Kandeh Yumkella, chair of UN-Energy, and Charles Holliday, chairman of Bank of America. “There is a lot of money ready to be put down in different parts of the globe.”

There are certainly tensions about how increased investment in energy could play out. In the short term, countries trying to build their electrical capacity may turn to fossil fuels, the most readily available and cheapest forms of energy.

At the summit in Abu Dhabi, however, economic and political leaders signaled their ambitions to work for renewable energy and improved energy access. “[We must] rely on science and technology to increase energy efficiency, build a circular national economy featuring low input, high output and low energy consumption and emissions, and drive sustainable economic and social development with minimum energy and resource consumption,” the Chinese premier, Wen Jiabao, told the summit on Monday.

South Korea’s Prime Minister, Kim Hwan-sik, also called for increased investment in renewables, stressing the need for “active financial support and technology transfers from developed countries to their developing counterparts.”

Issues like this will likely come up in discussions in June 2012, when global climate talks—known as Rio +20—are convened in Brazil. Ban will officially launch the initiative there, with 18 years to deliver.