STORY: UN / ENERGY AND CLIMATE CHANGE WRAP
SOURCE: UNTV
TRT: 3.08
RESTRICTIONS: NONE
LANGUAGE: ENGLISH / NATS

DATELINE: 28 APRIL 2010, NEW YORK CITY / FILE

SHOTLIST:

FILE – RECENT, NEW YORK CITY

1. Wide shot, exterior UN building

28 APRIL 2010, NEW YORK CITY

2. Zoom out, dais
3. SOUNDBITE (English) Ban Ki-moon, United Nations Secretary-General:
“We must urgently transform the global energy system. The decisions we make today on our energy future will have far-reaching consequences for climate change, for development, for economic growth and global security.”
4. Wide shot, dais
5. SOUNDBITE (English) Ban Ki-moon, United Nations Secretary-General:
“Reliable access to affordable energy is essential for economic growth and meeting the MDGs. Achieving the Goals also means putting the brakes on climate change. We need to grow, but we need to grow green. We need to provide affordable energy to all, and we need to stop the rise in greenhouse gas emissions.”
6. Zoom in, end of meeting
7. Tracking shot, Secretary-General leaving
8. Wide shot, Secretary-General arriving at press conference
9. SOUNDBITE (English) Ban Ki-moon, United Nations Secretary-General:
“Access to energy needs to be expanded in the cleanest, most efficient way possible. Toward that end, the Advisory Group has called for a 40 per cent reduction in global energy intensity by 2030. We need to scale-up renewable energy and other green technologies. These are ambitious goals, but they are achievable. And they are necessary.”
10. Med shot, photographers
11. SOUNDBITE (English) Kandeh K. Yumkella, United Nations Industrial Development Organization (UNIDO) Director-General:
“Everybody agrees on the need of greater energy efficiency reducing energy waste, but when it comes to the details, it’s not easy to do. People call it the low hanging fruit, but people are not picking that fruit. We’ve indicated here what we believe can be done to in fact achieve significant energy efficiency, because we believe that’s part of the transformative change, and change opportunity that we see in fact engender a new industrial revolution that will lift people out of poverty, also deal with some of the issues of climate change.”
12. Wide shot, reporters
13. SOUNDBITE (English) Achim Steiner United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) Executive Director:
“How on earth are we going to keep the lights on in the future? How on earth are we going to ensure that development which needs energy will actually have access to that energy? Because if you do not address the issues – and Kandeh referred to them, and Helge, and the Secretary-General just now – there are issues of security, of – if you want – access to fossil fuels, hydrocarbons, but also other forms of energy security considerations that are increasingly also affecting the level of security of the energy market, and that little thing called carbon emissions in the atmosphere.”
14. Wide shot, dais
15. Med shot, the Secretary-General meeting Sultan Al-Jaber, Assistant Foreign Minister, United Arab Emirates and Special Envoy for Energy and Climate Change

STORYLINE:

Increasing access to clean energy and improving its efficiency will be vital to both enhancing global prosperity and combating climate change, according to a new report released today (28 April) by United Nations (UN) Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon’s advisory group on the nexus between energy and climate.

At the launch of the publication in New York, Ban stressed that the global energy system must be urgently transformed and warned that decisions made today “will have far-reaching consequences for climate change, for development, for economic growth and global security.”

Some three billion people worldwide rely on traditional biomass for cooking and heating, resulting in adverse health effects if used in inadequately ventilated buildings, with 1.5 billion having no access to electricity.

A well-performing energy system will propel success towards meeting the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) and in spurring industrial development in low- and middle-income countries, according to the report by the high-level UN Energy and Climate Change Advisory Group.

The Secretary-General pointed out that “achieving the Goals also means putting the brakes on climate change” and the challenge will be to “provide affordable energy to all” while also stopping the rise in greenhouse gas emissions.

According to the World Bank, countries with underperforming energy systems could lose up to two per cent of growth potential annually due to electric power outages, inefficient use of scarce energy sources and others.

At a later press conference, Ban told reporters that “access to energy needs to be expanded in the cleanest, most efficient way possible” noting that toward that end, the Advisory Group has called for a 40 per cent reduction in global energy intensity by 2030.

He said that “these are ambitious goals, but I think they are achievable, and they are necessary.”

Kandeh K. Yumkella, Director-General of the UN Industrial Development Organization (UNIDO), speaking to reporters, highlighted the need to create incentives for a transformation to a “new industrial revolution.”

Yumkella, who chairs the Advisory Group, also pointed out the need to ensure that developed countries do not solely extract energy – such as oil and gas – from poor nations, but that they also ensure that developing countries’ energy needs are met to ensure global security.

For his part, Achim Steiner, Executive Director of the UN Environment Programme (UNEP) and a member of the Group, asked “how on earth are we going to keep the lights on in the future?” and pointed to security issues “and that little thing called carbon emissions in the atmosphere.”

The study by the Advisory Group – set up by the Secretary-General last year and comprising 20 business leaders, academics and representatives of the United Nations and civil society – called on nations to commitment themselves to two key complementary goals.

The group emphasizes, urging high-income nations to make this a development assistance priority and secure financing, middle-income countries to share relevant expertise and experience; and low-income countries to help create the right local institutional, regulatory and policy environment for investments – including by the private sector – to be made.

The other challenge is to slash global energy intensity, measured by the quantity of energy per unit of gross domestic product (GDP), the study notes.