The transition to clean and sustainable energy systems is critical to address climate change - and why it is emerging as a core issue at this year’s Climate Action Summit hosted by UN Secretary-General, António Guterres.
The Summit, which will take place at the UN Headquarters in New York City on 23 September 2019, is focused on boosting ambition and accelerating progress towards achieving the objectives of the Paris Agreement and the Sustainable Development Goals. It aims at moving forward initiatives in nine interdependent tracks – including the Energy Transition Track which is led by the governments of Denmark and Ethiopia and supported by Sustainable Energy for All (SEforALL).
The G20 Ministerial Meeting on Energy Transitions and Global Environment for Sustainable Growth took place 15 - 16 June, hosted by the Government of Japan in the city of Karuizawa. Director of Policy and Programs, Glenn Pearce-Oroz, represented SEforALL during the ministerial meeting as well as during the G20 Global Summit on Financing Energy Efficiency, Innovation and Clean Technology that took placein Tokyo a few days earlier. The message delivered at the ministerial meeting was that thanks to the Tracking SDG7 Reports, G20 support to global energy access can and should be better targeted to high deficit countries for both electrification and clean cooking. Pearce-Oroz stressed that 2 out of 5 people on the planet still do not have access to clean cooking.The final G20 Ministerial Meeting Communiqué included the importance of clean cooking and G20’s recognition of its importance for social and economic development. During the G20 Global Summitthat took place in Tokyo, Pearce-Oroz also presented the importance of cooling for all as a necessary part of future energy efficiency discussions.He also launched the “Global ESCO Network” which will be housed at the Copenhagen Centre on Energy Efficiency, SEforALL’s Efficiency Hub. The new network will convey lessons on energy efficiency frameworks and financing innovations across regions and countries.
High-level policy-makers from around the world met in Vancouver, Canada from May 27-29 for the 10th Clean Energy Ministerial (CEM) and fourth Mission Innovation (MI) Ministerial. CEO and UN SRSG Rachel Kyte gave three keynote addresses during the summit. During a CEM plenary, Kyte urged energy ministers to recognize and prioritize energy efficiency as critical to the energy transition and achievement of the Sustainable Development Goals. To the ministers attending MI, she implored them to raise their collective ambition to match the scale of the energy and climate challenges we face. She also provided the keynote address at the Women in Clean Energy Breakfast hosted by the Canadian government. Here, she stressed the need for disaggregated data to really understand who in the world lacks energy access, the potential of the clean energy transformation to lift up women around the world, and the significance of initiatives like Equal by 30 for enabling gender equality in the energy sector. As such, she announced that SEforALL has joined Equal by 30, which is a public commitment by public and private sector organizations to work towards equal pay, equal leadership and equal opportunities for women in the clean energy sector by 2030.
On 23 May, CEO and SRSG Rachel Kyte gave a keynote at the Open Ministerial Session of the ITF Summit in Leipzig, Germany. The transport sector consumes about 19% of global energy use and contributes 23% of energy-related CO2 emissions. What’s more, transport has the highest growth of CO2 emissions of any sector. Decarbonizing the transport sector is critical if we are to meet commitments from Paris Agreement and stay within the 1.5 degree target.
CEO and SRSG Rachel Kyte met with UN Secretary-General António Guterres to provide a briefing and insight on the findings of the 2019 Tracking SDG7: The Energy Progress Report released on May 22, 2019 and an update on planning for his Climate Action Summit taking place in September. Kyte serves on the steering committee for the Secretary-General’s Climate Summit and SEforALL is the supporting institution for the Energy Transition Track. The Tracking SDG7 report provides the international community with the data to assess progress towards Sustainable Development Goal 7 (SDG7).