May 2012

Dear Colleague:

Expectations are rising for the U.N. Conference on Sustainable Development (Rio+20) in June. Efforts to dramatically increase energy access for the poor in a climate friendly way are gaining momentum, linkages between climate change and migration are raising concerns, issues between climate and trade are becoming more important, and new satellite monitoring tools provide promising approaches to measure and reward countries that reduce deforestation. Yet the EU’s chief climate negotiator, Artur Runge-Metzger, warns that the goal of limiting the rise in global temperatures to 2 degrees C continues to elude us and we are probably heading towards 3.8 or 4.2 degrees of warming.

Michele de Nevers

Rio+20 and Energy Access

On April 20, 2012, CGD hosted a discussion on Delivering Sustainable Energy for All: Opportunities at Rio+20, with a keynote address by UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon. The Secretary General highlighted the UN Sustainable Energy for All (SE4All) initiative, which seeks to provide electricity to the 1.3 billion people—one in five globally—currently without it, and clean cooking fuel for the 2.7 billion people using dirty biofuels by 2030, all while averting a climate catastrophe.

The extreme energy poverty found in poor regions and most of Africa presents a major opportunity to bypass traditional infrastructure and adopt new renewable energy technologies, says African Renewable Energy Alliance. Africa’s leapfrog to mobile technology platforms when landlines were constrained provides an example of the possibilities for scaling renewable energies.

A new report, Energizing Rio+20: How the United States Can Promote Sustainable Energy for All at the 2012 Earth Summit, from the CEO of Climate Advisors and CGD Visiting Senior Associate Nigel Purvis, with co-author Abigail Jones, presents more practical suggestions for ways that the United States can help to support sustainable energy access goals while also creating jobs at home and strengthening the U.S. economy.

At the third annual Clean Energy Ministerial (CEM) meeting, held in London on April 26, 2012, 23 participating countries also reiterated commitment to the UN Sustainable Energy for All goals. In a post-CEM blog, Council on Foreign Relations expert Michael Levi noted that government support for renewable energy will not be “stable” due to falling solar costs and tight government budgets. “What people do want—and need—is that support be ‘predictable,’” Levit noted. Akin to CGD’s report on Energizing Rio+20, the CEM meeting called for innovative financing, suggesting an opportunity that may provide the biggest gains. A complementary CGD report, A Green Venture Fund to Finance Clean Technology for Developing Countries suggests ideas for such innovative financing.

Migration and Climate Change

On April 20, 2012, CGD hosted a discussion on a new Asian Development Bank report, “Addressing Climate Change and Migration in Asia and the Pacific,” notes that the disaster--prone Asia Pacific region will see a surge in climate--induced migration this century.

In Bangladesh for instance, as access to contraception falls and worries about the future grow, climate migrants are creating a baby boom in Dhaka’s slums. When flooding and erosion displace families, they often take refuge in urban areas and have little option but to live in slums.

Image: DFID / Rafiqur Rahman Raqu

Lack of education about family planning, poor access to birth control and worries about financial security combine to result in large families. While Bangladesh’s total fertility rate -- the average number of children born to a woman during her lifetime -- has plummeted over the past five decades from a peak of more than 7, the total fertility rate is 4.5 in urban slums, far higher than the overall national rate of 2.5.

A recent UK report on “Migration and Global Environmental Change” suggests that migration can represent a ‘transformational’ adaptation to environmental change, and in many cases will be an extremely effective way to build long-term resilience. The report recommends that international policy should aim to ensure that migration occurs in a way that maximizes benefits to the individual, and to both source and destination communities.

A CGD initiative on Migration as a Tool for Disaster Recovery also suggests that expanding international migration for disaster-affected populations is potentially a hugely powerful and very low-cost addition to traditional post-disaster assistance.

Trade and Climate Change

A new Stockholm Environment Agency report asks disturbing questions about whether economic growth in developing countries will be cut if rich countries limit their greenhouse gas emissions by reducing consumption. The report finds that if rich-nations changed consumption to limit greenhouse gas emissions by purchasing fewer products, reducing waste, and eating less meat, this would shrink international trade with poorer countries, where many goods—especially clothing—are made. They conclude that sourcing clothes from lower-income, lower-emitting countries, direct technology transfer, buying carbon credits or providing aid through vehicles such as the UN Green Climate Fund and importing higher-cost, higher-quality and value-added goods, could help to offset the losses to poorer countries.

Image: Flickr user Adalbertop

Meanwhile in Europe, a draft European Commission communication on renewable energy finds that “renewable energy export opportunities will strongly depend on the elimination of trade barriers in and free access to key emerging renewable energy markets such as in China, India and Brazil.” We can expect to see climate related trade issues between the EU and rising emerging market countries heat up as EU member states squabble over policies to replace existing emissions limit targets and as subsidies for renewable energy fall victim to the region’s economic crisis.

Using Satellite Monitoring to Reduce Deforestation

CGD colleagues David Wheeler, Dan Hammer and Robin Kraft have developed an exciting new global scorecard and performance rating system that can be used to track progress in reducing forest clearing. The Forest Conservation Performance Rating is a system of color-coded ratings for tropical forest conservation performance that can be implemented for local areas, countries, regions, and the entire pan-tropics. The ratings reward tropical forest conservation in three dimensions:

(1) exceeding expectations, given an area’s forest clearing history and development status; (2) meeting or exceeding global REDD+ goals; and (3) achieving an immediate reduction in forest clearing. The rating system is based on CGD’s FORMA (Forest Monitoring for Action--Rapid Identification of Pan-tropical Deforestation Using Moderate-Resolution Remotely Sensed Data).