The report, which is based on recent results from the Emissions Database for Global Atmospheric Research (EDGAR) and latest statistics for energy use and other activities, shows large national differences between industrialized countries. Over the period 1990-2010, in the EU-27 and Russia CO2 emissions decreased by 7% and 28% respectively, while the USA’s emissions increased by 5% and the Japanese emissions remained more or less constant. The industrialized countries that have ratified the Kyoto Protocol (so called ‘ratifying Annex 1 countries’) and the USA, in 1990 caused about two-thirds of global CO2 emissions. Their share of global emissions has now fallen to less than half the global total.

Continued growth in the developing countries and emerging economies and economic recovery by the industrialized countries are the main reasons for a record breaking 5.8% increase in global CO2 emissions between 2009 and 2010. Most major economies contributed to this increase, led by China, USA, India and EU-27 with increases of 10%, 4%, 9% and 3% respectively. The increase is significant even when compared to 2008, when global CO2 emissions were at their highest before the global financial crisis. It can be noted that in EU-27, CO2 emissions remain lower in absolute terms than they were before the crisis (4.0 billion tonnes in 2010 as compared to 4.2 billion tonnes in 2007).

At present, the USA emits 16.9 tonnes CO2 per capita per year, over twice as much as the EU-27 with 8.1 tonnes. By comparison, Chinese per capita CO2 emissions of 6.8 tonnes are still below the EU-27 average, but now equal those of Italy. It should be noted that the average figures for China and EU-27 hide significant regional differences.

Long term global growth in CO2 emissions continues to be driven by power generation and road transport, both in industrial and developing countries. Globally, they account for about 40% and 15% respectively of the current total and both have consistent long-term annual growth rates of between 2.5% and 5%.

Throughout the Kyoto Protocol period, industrialized countries have made efforts to change their energy sources mix. Between 1990 and 2010 they reduced their dependence on coal (from 25% to 20% of total energy production) and oil (from 38% to 36.5%), and shifted towards natural gas (which increased from 23% to 27 %), nuclear energy (from 8% to 9%) and renewable energy (from 6.5% to 8%). In addition they made progress in energy savings, for example by insulation of buildings, more energy-efficient end-use devices and higher fuel efficiencies.

The report shows that the current efforts to change the mix of energy sources cannot yet compensate for the ever increasing global demand for power and transport. This needs to be considered in future years in all efforts to mitigate the growth of global greenhouse gas emissions, as desired by the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change, the Bali Action Plan and the Cancún agreements.

Source: European Commission Joint Research Centre

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Ubbink East Africa is currently manufacturing solar panels with outputs of between 13 and 120 watts, targeting rural households. Ubbink East Africa is a joint venture of Ubbink B.V – a wholly owned subsidiary of Centrotec Sustainable AG- and Chloride Exide (Kenya), its local partner, and is the first to make photovoltaic (PV) solar panels in East and Central Africa, Nairobi’s Business Daily reported.

Centrotec Sustainable AG CEO Gert-Jan Huisman said that almost 98 percent of the rural population in Africa does not have access to grid electric power supplies, and this was holding back rural economic development.

Solar panels have the added advantage of being environmentally friendly, as most common energy sources in the African countryside are currently highly polluting kerosene lamps and diesel generators.

By. Joao Peixe, Deputy Editor OilPrice.com

Reproduced With the Kind Permission of Our Source: OilPrice.com

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In reporting the projected losses, which some estimates by the Power and Energy Ministry project to be even higher, Wickremasooriya said, “However, the management also took some decisions, maybe to show more profits by using excessive hydro power. This was not the usual procedure at the CEB. Optimal use of water is the key. By taking a gamble, especially when there is no rain, one is compelled to switch to expensive energy sources… This in turn puts a lot of pressure on the CEB,” Colombo’s The Island Online newspaper reported.

The CEB is seeking to diversify is indigenous power generating sources beyond a heavy reliance on hydroelectricity, according to Power and Energy Minister Patali Champika Ranawaka. A Ministry source said, speaking on condition of anonymity, “Power generating through hydro power plants has decreased and it is not enough to fulfill the consumer demand due to heavy decline in the capacity of reservoirs which are feeding hydro power plants.”

Addressing issues of the 1.5 gigawatt hour per day Victoria hydro power plant, the country’s largest power station, which produces 10 percent of the nation’s electricity Victoria hydro power plant’s CEB electricity engineer in charge of operations J.A.S. Jayasinghe noted that while the capacity of the Victoria reservoir is 722 million cubic meters, it currently it has only 270 mcm, commenting, “As a percentage it is only 30 percent. When the reservoir is full, Victoria generates 675 gigawatt hours, but the present power generating capacity is only enough to generate 70 gigawatt hours.”

By. Charles Kennedy, Deputy Editor OilPrice.com

Source: OilPrice.com

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“Charcoal prices in Somaliland have increased in the past six months from 25,000 [Somaliland] shillings [US$5.50] per 25kg sack to 40,000 shillings [$7.50], making it difficult to us to buy charcoal, which we depend on to cook food for our families,” Muna Ahmed, an internally displaced mother of nine, told IRIN. “We are now suffering; we do not know what to cook with.”

The average urban household uses two to three bags of charcoal per month. In 2005, this monthly expenditure was about $10.

Abdi-Risak Bashir Libah, an environmental director at Candlelight for Health, Education and Environment, an NGO, said: “Because of the increasing urban population in Somaliland and the high demand for charcoal, its prices will increase even more. The problem will continue, unless alternatives are found.”

Some 95 percent of Somaliland’s 1.6m urban residents – about half the total population – use charcoal as their main source of cooking energy. This amounts to an annual consumption of some two million bags and up to 2.5 million trees, according to a 2007 report by the Academy for Peace and Development (APD).

The consequent deforestation reduces rainfall, soil depth and grass cover in Somaliland, where up to 65 percent of the population are pastoralists. As the viability of this livelihood diminishes, many pastoralists have turned to charcoal production to make ends meet, further accelerating the deforestation.

Read more of the story here at the IRIN news service:
SOMALIA: Record charcoal prices in Somaliland prompt search for alternatives

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How People Arrived Here:

guinea bissau charcoal price

The CBC Director General, Dr Mohan Kaul said on Saturday at a two-day Power Summit on Nigeria organized by the body in London that the government estimates that lack of power costs the Nigerian economy $100bn every year through lost output and high costs for local businesses.

He said Nigeria’s Presidential Taskforce on Power (PTFP) and the World Bank had identified the lack of electricity as a major factor inhibiting development.

Kaul, however, expressed optimism that the country, being the 10th biggest oil reserve in the world, could build a secured and diversified power system from purely energy sources.

He expressed the belief that in spite of the various challenges the country has to grapple with, the business environment in Nigeria has changed `significantly for the better.’

“Growth has been strong despite weak infrastructure, and the potential for even faster growth has never been better. Privatization has achieved more in the last year than it had in the last ten.

“There is a growing consensus in the industry and on the streets that finally, the sun may be about to shine on the Nigerian power sector” he added.

Also, Mr. Pascal Dozie, Co-Chair of the CBC said the body has a mandate from the Heads of Commonwealth countries since 1997 to promote economic development within Commonwealth countries and has been directing interested investors in the power sector to Nigeria.

“Already we are getting positive feedbacks because there is a very logical and systematic program which the federal government is following in order to guarantee the implementation process’’ he revealed.

Source African Press Agency

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Two years in preparation, The Energy Report breaks new ground with its global scope and its consideration of total energy needs including transport, and making adequate and safe energy available to all.

“If we continue to rely on fossil fuels, we face a future of increasing anxieties over energy costs, energy security and climate change impacts,” said WWF Director General Jim Leape. “We are offering an alternative scenario – far more promising and entirely achievable.

“The Energy Report shows that in four decades we can have a world of vibrant economies and societies powered entirely by clean, cheap and renewable energy and with a vastly improved quality of life.

“The report is more than a scenario – it’s a call for action. We can achieve a cleaner, renewable future, but we must start now.”

The two-part report contains a detailed analysis and scenario presented by respected energy consultancy Ecofys, an analysis by WWF, and a graphic narrative by OMA. It shows that by 2050, power, transport, industrial and domestic energy needs could be met with only isolated residual uses of fossil and nuclear fuels – vastly reducing anxieties over energy security, pollution and not least, catastrophic climate change.

Energy efficiency in buildings, vehicles and industry would be a key ingredient, along with an increase in the energy needs met through electric power, renewably generated and supplied through smart grids.

Under the Ecofys scenario, in 2050 total energy demand will be 15 percent lower than in 2005, despite increases in population, industrial output, freight and travel – and energy being made available to those currently not enjoying its benefits. The world no longer relies on coal, or nuclear fuels, while international rules and cooperation limit potential environmental damage from biofuel production and hydroelectricity development.

“In this report we are very deliberately not making extravagant assumptions about the benefits of technologies yet to come,” said Ecofys director Kees van der Leun. “This inherently means that this is a moderate estimate of the renewable energy future we could enjoy by 2050.”

“At Ecofys we know that solutions for the global energy challenge are at hand. There are numerous systems that use energy more efficiently, allowing us to manage current energy sources more carefully. Moreover, we understand the opportunities in using the vast amounts of sustainable energy that surround us.”

Providing reliable, affordable and clean energy on the scale required will need a global effort – similar to the global response to the world financial crisis. But the benefits would be much greater in the long term, with the savings from lower energy costs balancing total new investments in renewable energy and energy efficiency by 2040 and savings over a “Business-As-Usual” scenario amounting to around €4 trillion from lower energy costs alone by 2050.

Other benefits are savings from avoiding energy security conflicts, dirty spills and supply disruptions that are inherent in sourcing ever scarcer fossil fuels from more and more politically or environmentally challenging areas.

Importantly, The Energy Report scenario would see CO2 emissions from the world’s energy supply sector reduced by over 80 per cent by 2050 – providing a high level of confidence that the average global temperature rise will be limited to the less than the two degrees Celsius threshold identified as presenting unacceptable risks of catastrophic climate change.

“We will live differently, but we will live well,” said Jim Leape. “We must provide energy for all without imperiling our planet, and this report shows that we can.”

Source WWF

This post is licensed under a Creative Commons License.

Net News Publisher for World News

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Speaking at a two-day gas summit, Peters called on the industry to come up with strategies that will promote the use of natural gas to ensure South Africa’s security of energy supply.

“There is a growing momentum in the world’s quest to mitigate against climate change and global warming …proliferation and strengthening of natural gas has a significant impact in reducing carbon emissions if gas can help our new growth path without damaging the planet we need to explore that vigorously,” Peters said.

According to the National Energy Regulator of SA, gas accounts for less than 2 percent of South Africa’s energy needs with the country importing approximately 110 million gigajoules of natural gas per year from the Pande and Termane gas fields in Mozambique.

The slow uptake of gas has been attributed to a number of factors including the relatively low cost and large infrastructure capacity of electricity in past decades. Peters said a growth to 10 percent of gas consumption is projected within a decade.

Government also wants to increase the role of gas in the economy to about R30 billion through a gas fired electrical power plant in South Africa’s west coast that will supply natural gas power to Saldanha Bay and Western Cape.

“So there is ample opportunity lying ahead, there is a huge investment to be made in the sector,” Peters said.

She said the power outages that plunged South Africa into darkness in 2008 as a result of the pressure on national electricity grid were an indication on an imminent threat to the country’s energy security.

As next year’s hosts of the Congress of Parties on climate change (COP 17), South Africa is under pressure to gravitate towards cleaner energy sources.

Peters said promotion of natural gas usage had a potential to drastically reduce carbon emissions as demanded by the United Nations convention on climate change which South Africa is signatory.

“If gas can help us to move towards a clean world, we need to look at it vigorously and we need the help of the gas industry to achieve that, we can only do it if we work together.”

A decision has been taken by the department to diversify energy use in the country to ensure consumers make use of all energy sources including gas and solar power.

Source: BUA News

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He added that apart from financing the MSI project, part of the loan will finance the sewerage system in the northern tourist resort of Grand Bay and the highway which the Mauritian government projects to build in the north in order to alleviate traffic congestion in the capital.

Wilter further stressed that France holds the first place among countries that invest in the island.

Speaking on the MSI project, Wilter declared that, in agreement with the local authorities, the €125 million will be used to finance the exploitation of new energy sources, put in place new environmental norms and create new management facilities at the public service sector to manage these new norms.

Also Wilter declared that the French government is very much interested in financing the MSI project here as Mauritius, among other African countries, is well advanced in sustainable development.

For his part, Vice Prime Minister and Minister of Public Infrastructures Rashid Beebeejaun said a regional cooperation will be established concerning the adaptation of country members of the Indian Ocean Commission to the impact of climatic change.

To this effect, Rashid Beebeejaun declared that the FDA is making a gift of €1 million.

And Beebeejaun pointed out that the FDA will finance small and medium enterprises with a sum of €40 million.

The MSI is a project expected to increase the country’s level of energy autonomy by 65 percent in 2028 through the efficient use of energy and the production of energy from a mix of renewable sources, such as the sun, wind, biomass and waves.

Source African Press Agency

Net News Publisher

The World Development Report 2010 : Development and Climate Change, released in advance of the December meetings on climate change in Copenhagen, cites evidence that global warming of 2 degrees C above pre-industrial temperatures could result in permanent reductions in annual per capita consumption of 4 to 5% in Africa.

The authors call for immediate action to ensure that Africa’s prospects are not compromised by climate variability and climate change.

At the global level, rich countries, which produced most of the greenhouse gas emissions of the past, must act now to ensure that the world is not locked into an unsafe climate, the report says.

They need to adopt ambitious emission reduction targets at home—which would also boost demand for alternative energy sources—as well as provide financial support to developing countries for adaptation and to lay the foundations for low-carbon growth, continued the report.

“Countries in Sub-Saharan Africa are disproportionately affected by climate change,” said Marianne Fay, co-director of the report and Chief Economist for Sustainable Development at the World Bank.

“They need scaled-up financial and technological support to help vulnerable people adapt to climate change, while also meeting urgent energy needs,” Fay told journalists in Nairobi.

While climate variability is not a new factor in Africa’s history, the incidence and severity of extreme weather events, both floods and droughts, has increased sharply in recent years, and climate projections indicate that this trend will be intensified, noted the report.

According to the World Bank, the region’s natural vulnerability will thus be increased with climate change.

There could be serious impacts on people who depend on rain fed agriculture, which employs about 70% of Africa’s population. Without strong improvements in agricultural productivity, the region’s food security will be at risk, added the report..

Currently, Kenyans are experiencing the impact of climate change through serious food, water supply and electricity shortfalls that are also draining budgetary resources and dampening prospects for economic recovery from the global economic crisis.

“In Africa, adaptation and climate risk management are becoming core development objectives, as governments and citizens become more aware of the impact of climate change on their survival,” said Johannes Zutt, World Bank Country Director for Kenya.

Source African Press Agency

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