Around the world 1.4 billion people do not have access to electricity and 2.7 billion still live without clean, safe cooking fuels.
It’s an issue at the heart of the climate debate. How can developing nations gain access to energy whilst keeping emissions under control?
The UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon’s Sustainable Energy For All initiative aims to tackle this head on, by doubling the share of renewable power in the global energy mix.
It appears a Herculean task.
But speaking at the 2012 Low Carbon Energy for Development Network (LCEDN) meeting in Brighton, Andrew Scott, Research Fellow at the Overseas Development Institute (ODI) told RTCC that the technologies and the expertise exist to make this a reality.
What’s needed are solid energy and climate finance guarantees – a key goal for the COP18 UNFCCC talks in Doha later this year.