Asian versus Global Strategies for Energy Fairness and Reduced Carbon Footprint — The Promise of the CDM

Access to plentiful supplies of affordable energy is a key requirement for sustainable economic and social development in all emerging nations, and nowhere more so than in Asia. Global primary energy demand is expected in the reference scenario of the International Energy Agency (IEA) to increase by 1.6% per annum from 2004 to 2030, growing from 11.2 billion tones of oil equivalent (btoe) to 17.1 btoe in 2030, more than a 50% increase in total (IEA World Energy Outlook-WEO, 2006). 70% of this increase in energy demand is forecast to come from developing countries with 48.9% coming from developing nations in Asia (including China 30% and India 9.0%) with populations and economies growing much faster than OECD nations, shifting the focus of global energy demand to Asia. About 50% of the increase in global primary energy use is for electricity generation and one-fifth to meet transportation mainly in form of oil-based fuels. The fossil fuels (oil, gas and coal) in the International Energy Agency's (IEA's) reference scenario continue to dominate primary energy supply over the next 25 years. Available fossil fuel reserves are just about adequate to meet that demand growth, but many doubt that they will be adequate to sustain energy demand growth much beyond 2030. Such projections raise several concerns, including: sufficient long-term energy supply, because of the finite nature of fossil fuel reserves; investment strategies to develop suitable and sustainable future energy infrastructure; environmental and climatic issues associated with the resulting carbon and other greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions from fossil fuel usage; increased competition for diminishing fossil fuel reserves; unequal access of the world's population to adequate energy supplies. The Clean Development Mechanism (CDM) is a provision of the Kyoto Protocol to The United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNCCC) that offers a new pathway to encourage technology transfer, promote sustainable development in host countries, reduce greenhouse gases (GHG) emissions and assist Annex B countries (developed countries listed in Annex B of the Kyoto Protocol) to cost-effectively meet their commitments under the Kyoto Protocol.