By Laurence L Delina

Commentary Nov. 22, 2009 - 07:04AM JST ( 8 )

As the world’s policymakers are gearing up for the year’s (or even this generation’s) very important deliberations in Copenhagen in December, people especially the non-specialists are wondering what is it all about. They might have the grasp of what climate change is, but a few might realized how it came about or what contributed to it.

It’s simple. The world has overtly become addicted to fossil fuels in the past century to meet the demands of the industrial revolution. This addiction has resulted to vast amounts of pollutants concentrated in the atmosphere such that it traps the heat from the sun and could no longer be rebounded back to space therefore staying on earth for good – this is called the greenhouse effect. Over time, more heat remains and the earth became warm. Blame it then to unsustainable use of energy sources.
 
Energy, as Einstein defines it, is what describes “everything.” Einstein, perhaps, was the first human being to expound on this claim and revolutionized the way we think about energy. It is always associated with “power.” It not only drives economies, but also defines quality of life. The amount of energy one consumes is always in direct proportion to their economic status.

Observe that the world’s economic superpowers are also the huge consumers of energy, and vice versa. To state it simply, energy makes the world go round, and at the same time defines the polarity between the rich and the poor. This development truth is being compounded by truths manifested by the changing climate. The way human beings treat energy since the dawn of the Industrial Age has translated into great concentrations of harmful gases in the atmosphere, which makes the earth warmest in the last 10 years.

The realities of the warming planet laid down the basis for sustainability to become this generation’s byword. Everybody talks about it - from pan global organizations such as the United Nations and global financiers such as the World Bank, to large and small corporations. They have not only embraced, but also professed, sustainability as an organizational mantra.

In fact, almost every organization now has a sustainability department, or at least has somebody assigned to do something about it. Sustainability, in simplest terms, means “capability to being continued.” In the environmental sense, this continuity also entails a continuity that brings no harm to the environment. Talking about a sustainable world will be a continuing issue especially as the earth has begun showing manifestations of change in its climatic systems, and as policymakers are gearing up for climate talks and deals in December.
 
We need to change the way we view energy. This should be a drastic and radical change to totally shift from intensive, carbon-based energy to one that is sustainable. Sustainable energy could not only mean sourcing, creating, distributing and consuming energy in a continuous fashion utilizing a system that does not bring further harm to the environment, but it also possesses a greater definition, that is making energy available across the board, reaching especially those who for years remain electricity-deprived.  Sustainable energy is therefore an array of challenges.
 
Notice that our definition tells of a “path” - from source/producer to end-of-pipe/consumer. Here, we are shown the first challenge, which is to make this path as clean as possible and ensure that there is less/minimum (to nothing if possible) intrusion towards the environment.
 
The definition also mentions a “system.” Because energy flows from A to B, a particular system is needed to facilitate the transfer. There are serious problems in these systems at the moment. From source to final consumption, we have problems. Our current sources of energy are mostly dirty, usually in fossilized forms emitting large quantities of pollutants responsible for our warming planet. At the same time, we are losing energy in the process. A large amount of which are wasted before it reached points of consumption. These problems have been long recognized and current policy suggests two ways: reversion to renewables and non-fossil sources (to address problems at source) and energy conservation by increasing efficiency (to address problems along-the-way). This is the second challenge.
 
Sustainable energy also talks about access for all. This means that although energy is currently concentrated in the rich world, the necessary infrastructure is needed to be provided at the opposite direction in order to make it available all throughout. The latest estimate is that more than 50% of the world population still lacks access to electricity. These are people who do not have lights at night and who still rely on traditional fuel to cook their food. The third challenge therefore is about ways to address energy poverty, which means closing the gap between the energy-rich and the energy-poor.
 
Summing up, sustainable energy is about shifting the way we source and produce our energy from being fossil-fuel addicts to being clean energy users. This means extracting energy from environmentally benign systems (biofuels) or renewable sources, no more no less. It is also about ensuring that losses along the way as energy is transported from source and distributed to consumers are kept at a minimum, which means increasing efficiency. Moreover, sustainable energy is about providing a workable policy environment wherein these new systems can thrive. Lastly, it is also about zeroing out the statistic about electricity-deprived people.
 
Laurence L Delina is currently consultant to the Energy Security Section of the United Nations Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific (UNESCAP). UNESCAP is the U.N.’s development arm in the Asia-Pacific region and is headquartered in Bangkok.

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