The EU and US have agreed to establish an energy council for cooperation on energy policy and technology research. US President Barack Obama and EU leaders met in early November to discuss the new council, which will provide a framework for bilateral dialogue on global energy security and policies to move to low-carbon energy sources.

Christian Kjaer, Chief Executive of EWEA said the agreement “shows the growing importance of energy in international relations. Energy security and climate change will have an ever greater role in global politics.” He added that “it is clearly important to improve dialogue between the EU and US on energy issues and to boost scientific cooperation. If they are serious about tackling climate change, they need to act fast in reducing global CO2 emissions and radically change the way energy is produced.

“The focus of this new cooperation has to be on the technology that is ready to be deployed and deliver CO2 reductions targets in the short term - by 2015 according to the IPCC. This means that wind energy has to be a key element of the new cooperation and top of the new council’s agenda.“

Indeed, the conclusions to the meeting state that the council will “promote strengthened power grids to facilitate the deployment of renewable” and that the US and EU will “continue to deepen ongoing joint work on new and renewable technologies”.

EU Energy Commissioner Andris Piebalgs emphasised the importance of the new energy council in tackling the key issues of climate change and energy security.

The first meeting of the council was held on 4 November, chaired by Sweden's Enterprise and Energy Minister Maud Olofsson, whose country currently holds the EU Presidency.