World Energy Outlook 2006

� Policies encouraging more efficient production and use of energy
contribute almost 80% of the avoided CO 2 emissions in 2030, the
remainder arising from fuel switching. More efficient use of fuels, mainly
through improved efficiency of cars and trucks, accounts for almost
36%. More efficient use of electricity in a wide range of applications,
including lighting, air-conditioning, appliances and industrial motors
accounts for 30%. Greater efficiency in energy production accounts for
13%. Renewables and biofuels contribute another 12% and nuclear the
remaining 10%.
Background
Why an Alternative Policy Scenario? 1
The Reference Scenario presents a sobering vision of how the global energy
system could evolve in the next two-and-a-half decades. Without new
government measures to alter underlying energy trends, the world consumes
substantially more energy, mostly in the form of fossil fuels. The consequences
for energy security and emissions of climate-altering greenhouse gases are stark.
The major oil- and gas-consuming regions – including those that make up the
OECD – become even more reliant on imports, often from distant, unstable
parts of the world along routes that are vulnerable to disruption. Sufficient
natural resources exist to fuel such long-term growth in production and trade,
but there are formidable obstacles to mobilising the investment needed to
develop and use them. The projected rate of growth in fossil-fuel consumption
drives up carbon dioxide (CO2 ) and other greenhouse-gas emissions even more
quickly than in the past.
Policy-makers and the energy industry alike have increasingly acknowledged
over the last few years the twin threats to energy security and global climate
change. They accept the need for urgent action to address these threats. In July
2005, G8 leaders, meeting at Gleneagles with the leaders of several major
developing countries and heads of international organisations, including the
IEA, recognised that current energy trends are unsustainable and pledged
themselves to resolute action to combat rising consumption of fossil fuels and
related greenhouse-gas emissions. They called upon the IEA to, “advise on
alternative energy scenarios and strategies aimed at a clean, clever, and
competitive energy future”. 2 The analysis presented in this part of the WEO is
1. The preparation of the Alternative Policy Scenario in this Outlook benefited from a high-level
informal brainstorming meeting held at the IEA headquarters in Paris on 15 March 2006.
2. Gleneagles G8 Summit Communiqué, page 3. Available at: www.iea.org/G8/g8summits.htm.
162 World Energy Outlook 2006 - THE ALTERNATIVE POLICY SCENARIO
© OECD/IEA, 2007