Deciding the Future: Energy Policy Scenarios to 2050

Deciding the Future: Energy Policy Scenarios to 2050 World Energy Council 2007 Recommendations
83
Clear, reliable signals are necessary for
the financial community to feel confident
investing in sustainable energy projects
with some assurance of a return on
investment. Necessary energy
development depends directly on
ensured investments and steady
financing. Governments have tended not
to send strong and consistent signals to
markets about energy policies; as energy
is intimately tied to other societal goals,
such as the environment and standards
of living, where signals have been sent,
investors have tended to avoid long-term
sustainable energy projects in favour of
quick solutions.
Regulatory frameworks that ensure
attractiveness of markets and
competitiveness to industry. Energy
security depends on the ability to produce
and utilise energy resources efficiently
and with minimal damage to the
environment. For energy markets to
prosper, it is necessary that governments
establish basic ground rules for
competition, as chaos is detrimental to
markets and the population. However, too
much government interference hinders
the ability of industry to efficiently provide
energy services to keep up with demand.
Four areas for improved policy and
regulatory signals are: rules of energy
trade including environmental protection;
renewed efforts to harmonise regulations
across regions; the application of
competition rules to energy companies
which need scale to capture efficiencies
and manage risk; and, reasonable
costing of RDD&D and the timely
replacement of old technology with clean
technology.
Public and private sectors together
identify specific RDD&D projects and
outline funding frameworks to
accomplish them. As political attention
has been paid more and more to shortterm
issues intimately related to energy,
pre-competitive energy research and
development for longer term
requirements, necessarily led by
governments, has fallen to levels lower
than at any time since the early 1970s. If
the problems of energy sustainability
(defined by Accessibility, Availability, and
Acceptability) for the global population
are to be met, then much more, and
much better integrated (government and
industry) funding for research,
development, and demonstration of
sustainable energy technologies are
needed, and now. Because R&D process
takes both time and consistent
investment, global society cannot wait
until the problem becomes acute.
Coordinated international
transportation research, development
and demonstrations, and incentives
supporting market penetration of new
technologies. The transportation enduse
sector is the most vexing of all
energy sectors if secure energy supplies
and energy-related emissions are to be
stabilised and then reduced. Bold and
unconventional steps are called for.
Governments - working with industry -
must identify the issues, available
technologies, R&D needs, and the paths