Much needed symbiosis of energy security and climate goals

The aspirations of nations wanting to achieve higher economic growth orbit depend on their ability to meet their energy requirements. The concept of Energy Security can be referred to as the ability to secure accessible and affordable energy to meet their needs. Thus, energy security not only means to access but also takes into consideration affordability, here comes the concept of ‘quality' and ‘quantity’.

The SDG Goal 7 speaks about affordable and clean energy, with the well-established concept of climate change, the quality of the global energy basket will determine if the world is going to remain a habitable place for future generations. The Paris Agreement talks about keeping the global rise in temperature to within 2 degrees celsius, for this to happen the global energy mix has to transition from fossil fuel to renewable energy or to a more environmentally benign energy form.

Taking into consideration that a large section of people in developing and the under-developed world lack access to energy, it would be fair on behalf of the respective governments or authorities to look towards enabling access to energy rather than look at its carbon footprint. The above situation reflects a ‘mindset’ issue, to look at it as a problem of securing energy access, it has to be looked into as an opportunity to lay in foundations of renewable energy led world. Some of the initiatives like the International Solar Alliance and ‘One Sun One World One Grid’ initiative in India offers hope to leverage renewable energy forms.

Europe has moved into energy efficiency mode and the USA with its newly discovered shale gas reserves, has attained energy sufficiency, this leaves us with a question of how the rest of the world have to attain energy security in alignment with the global climate change policies. This would require a global collaborative effort, in exchange of technologies, academia research and findings, sharing of some of the tried and tested best practices and not to forget leverage the Green Climate Fund to channel funds to the ‘Global South’ to ensure a transition towards safe secure and clean energy basket.

The future of the global climate and energy mix is intertwined and has to embrace a symbiotic relationship.