Deciding the Future: Energy Policy Scenarios to 2050

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Deciding the Future: Energy Policy Scenarios to 2050 World Energy Council 2007 Recommendations
7. Recommendations
“L’intelligence c’est la faculté d’adaptation.” (Intelligence is the ability to adapt.)
André Gide
7.1. Setting Realistic Global
Targets
This report shows there is much to be done to
achieve the goals of energy Accessibility,
Availability, and Acceptability in a timely and
cost-efficient manner. All countries and regions
need to produce and use energy more efficiently
throughout the value chain, keep all energy
options open, and improve public awareness
and the timely acceptance of clean and
affordable energy technologies. The need for
large and prudent investments in the energy
supply infrastructure is acute.
Setting targets is important so that policies can
be defined and progress measured. The study
group believes that the following targets are
achievable, assuming the political will exists in
governments and industry to work closely
together on the policies, regulations and
investments required to move forward.
7.1.1. Accessibility
At present, almost two billion people do not have
access to commercial forms of energy and
another billion have only periodic unreliable
access. If about half of the world’s population
continues in this condition, the world as a whole
faces a significant threat to stability and the
quality of life everywhere. Based on input from
the study participants, the following targets can
be set with some confidence:
• By 2035, the number of people without
access to modern energy services can be
halved from two to one billion. In its
Millennium Statement WEC has already
defined the minimum level of access for
all households in the world as the
electricity equivalent of 500 kWh per
person per year.
• By 2050, this number can be halved again
to 500 million.
To achieve this will take an unprecedented level
of international cooperation and engagement by
governments and industry, as well as
introducing new paradigms for the transfer of
advanced technology from OECD countries to
the poorest, including incentives for the
investment of capital.
7.1.2. Availability
In recent years, there have been significant
disturbances in getting energy resources from
where they are plentiful to where they are
needed and converting them to sustainable
stationary, electricity, and transport services.
Sustainable means linking the availability targets
of governments and industry with the
accessibility and acceptability targets set out
here. Most of the disturbances have been
related to physical infrastructure inadequacies
(e.g., shipping, pipes, terminals, etc.) resulting
from insufficient investment (North America,
Western Europe, Latin America), although some
have occurred because of commercial,
regulatory, political, or market failures
(California, Ukraine, Belarus).
The investment needs of the energy sector are
huge, estimated by the IEA to be $20 trillion by