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News in Brief, BB200707

G8 Climate Compromise Welcomed by Global Wind Industry

12.07.2007

The Global Wind Energy Council (GWEC) welcomes the outcome of the recent G8 Summit on combating climate change. While the deal falls short of the ambitions of the EU, Canada and Japan, as well as the German government who hosted the meeting, it does send a clear signal that all G8 governments agree on the urgent need to fight climate change.

According to the Summit Declaration, there is a commitment “to take strong and early action to tackle climate change in order to stabilise greenhouse gas concentrations at a level that would prevent dangerous anthropogenic interference with the climate system.”

In particular, GWEC welcomes the call for at least a halving of global CO2 emissions by 2050. This target, which was adopted by the EU, Canada and Japan, will now be “seriously considered” in setting a global goal for emissions reductions.

G8 leaders also agreed that “the UN climate process is the appropriate forum for negotiating future global action on climate change” and stated their commitment to move forward in that forum. “We call on all parties to actively and constructively participate in the UN Climate Change Conference in Indonesia in December 2007 with a view to achieving a comprehensive post 2012-agreement (post Kyoto-agreement) that should include all major emitters,” reads the text.

The renewable energy industry supports this call for binding emissions reductions for the post-2012 period, and agrees that it “is vital that major economies that use the most energy and generate the majority of greenhouse gas emissions agree on a detailed contribution for a new global framework by the end of 2008 which would contribute to a global agreement under the UNFCCC by 2009.”

GWEC also welcomes the explicit reference to the recently published report by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), which had confirmed the urgent need to deploy existing renewable energy technologies at a large scale in order to combat dangerous climate change. As the leading renewable technology, wind power is in a prime position to deliver much needed cuts in CO2 emissions

The G8 Summit Declaration states the urgent need to “develop, deploy and foster the use of sustainable, less carbon intensive, clean energy and climate-friendly technologies in all areas of energy production and use,” including renewable energies, carbon capture and storage, clean coal and nuclear power. Of all these options, however, wind energy is the only one that can deliver deep cuts in CO2 emissions in the short space of time in which they are needed.

“The wind industry is poised and ready to do its part. Wind can make the greatest contribution to CO2 abatement of all the clean technologies in the critical period between now and 2020, when experts agree that global GHG emissions must peak and begin to decline,” said Steve Sawyer, GWEC’s Secretary General.

See here for the full text of the Summit Declaration

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