Over the last decades, many ECO contributors have worked behind the scenes to influence important international energy organisations, or openly campaigning against them. This year, the International Energy Agency, arguably the most influential energy agency globally, has thankfully changed sides.
In two reports this year, Net Zero by 2050: A Roadmap for the Global Energy Sector, and the World Energy Outlook 2021, the IEA showed strong evidence that the world can go to literally zero emissions in the energy sector by 2050. Standing up against its former allies in the fossil fuel sectors and aligned governments, the IEA recommended that all new investments in fossil fuels have to stop – now. The IEA further suggests a very high deployment of solar and wind at more than 70% of all energy used eventually; along with a tripling of annual energy efficiency globally across all economic sectors.
The IEA used the IPCC-defined yardstick of a remaining carbon budget of about 500 Gt CO2 and applied that to its analysis, while rejecting offsets beyond boundaries of the energy sector. The IEA scenario projection lands at about 1.4°C above pre-industrial temperatures.
ECO is very pleased to see that the IEA-proposed measures and policies, laid out in detail with milestones, will lead to almost 50% CO2 reduction by 2030 worldwide while focusing the strongest actions on rich and developed countries. The IEA also finds that this requires 4-5-fold growth in annual investments in clean technologies, renewables, energy efficiency and infrastructure to about US$4.5 trillion annually in the next few years. Most of that is profitable compared to a business as usual pathway.
ECO is still concerned that some of the proposed “zero-carbon” technologies included by the IEA will have detrimental effects on land and people. ECO is especially concerned that the projected growth in biomass energy and CCUS needs to be curtailed. Furthermore, the suggested doubling of nuclear power in the next decades is highly unsustainable, expensive and contributing to a super-toxic waste legacy that remains unresolved – which is why ECO has always and continues to promote a full phase out of nuclear.