ISLAMABAD: Asian countries are making a vital contribution to achieving global sustainable energy goals, however, the region performs strongly on ensuring electricity access for people and using more modern renewable energy, reveals a new World Bank report.

“There is room for further improvement on energy efficiency and access to clean, smoke-free cooking,” according to the report: “Progress Towards Sustainable Energy: Global Tracking Framework 2015”.

The report is the second in a series that tracks the world’s progress toward the three goals of the Sustainable Energy for All (SE4All) initiative – universal energy access, doubling the global rate of improvement in energy efficiency and doubling the share of renewable energy by 2030.

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Asia accounted for about 60 per cent of the global progress on energy access and clean energy objectives during 2010-2012 according to the report, contributing well beyond its share of global population and energy consumption.

Asia’s performance on expanding modern renewable energy (from sources like solar, wind and geothermal) was particularly strong. Whereas globally, consumption of modern renewable energy grew by 4pc per annum during 2010-12, in Asia that growth was almost twice as fast at close to 8pc.

Asia also moved rapidly to expand access to electricity for its citizens growing the population with electricity by 0.9pc annually over the tracking period 2010-12, well ahead of the global rate of 0.6pc.

And while the global population with access to clean, modern cooking fuels actually fell during 2010-12, Asia showed a modest improvement in access, but still far short of what is needed.

However, Asia’s progress on reducing the energy intensity of its economies with a compound annual growth rate of 1.3pc annually — a commonly used measure of energy efficiency — lagged behind the global average of 1.7pc.

On a global basis, the report found that 222 million people worldwide got access to electricity between 2010 and 2012, still leaving 1.1 billion people without access to energy. Meanwhile, 2.9bn people are still using biomass fuels like wood and dung. Most of this population is in rural areas of Sub-Saharan Africa, South Asia, and eastern Asia.

Also, while the world avoided using as much energy in 2012 as Japan used the same year, the report says energy intensity must decline at least 50pc faster to achieve the SE4All energy efficiency goal.

Global consumption of modern renewable energy accelerated by 4pc per year between 2010 and 2012, but must be closer to 8pc — two times the current rate — to reach the SE4All renewable energy goal.

Published in Dawn, June 20th, 2015

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