• Project Introduction

    Konrad Adenauer Stiftung and Hong Kong America Center

    Participants in the SDG Asia project should gain knowledge and insight about the four SDG sectors, and find examples and stories in their own communities.  This would both demonstrate their knowledge, and communicate it to other young people in the SA and SEA regions. The project will encourage young people to envision what development could look like in the four SDG sectors at three geographic levels, as if in three concentric circles:

    • in their local communities
    • in their nation
    • in the wider Asian region

    This project will help young participants to find their voice in development and tell stories of how development has worked, or not worked, or could work, in their communities.  They will tell these stories using digital means of sharing with peers across the developing world.    


Sustainable Cities and Communities (SDG 11)►

Affordable Clean Energy (SDG 7)

  • Affordable Clean Energy (SDG 7)

    SDG 7 - Affordable and Clean Energy
    Goal 7: Ensure access to affordable, reliable, sustainable and modern energy for all
    Energy is central to nearly every major challenge and opportunity the world faces today. Be it for jobs, security, climate change, food production or increasing incomes, access to energy for all is essential.

    Sustainable energy is opportunity – it transforms lives, economies and the planet.


    • Intro to SDG 7 URL

      Objectives: by the end of this module, you should be able to:

      • have the basic knowledge of what clean & renewable energy is;
      • know what other clean & renewable energy technologies other places are using;
      • formulate your own vision of how to meet the SDG7 targets




    • Background URL

      • Between 1990 and 2010, the number of people with access to electricity has increased by 1.7 billion, and as the global population continues to rise so will the demand for cheap energy. A global economy reliant on fossil fuels, and the increase of greenhouse gas emissions is creating drastic changes to our climate system. This is impacting every continent.
      • Efforts to encourage clean energy has resulted in more than 20 percent of global power being generated by renewable sources as of 2011. Still one in seven people lack access to electricity, and as the demand continues to rise there needs to be a substantial increase in the production of renewable energy across the world.
      • Ensuring universal access to affordable electricity by 2030 means investing in clean energy sources such as solar, wind and thermal. Adopting cost-effective standards for a wider range of technologies could also reduce the global electricity consumption by buildings and industry by 14 percent. This means avoiding roughly 1,300 mid-size power plants. Expanding infrastructure and upgrading technology to provide clean energy in all developing countries is a crucial goal that can both encourage growth and help the environment.   

    • Facts and Figures URL



      • One in five people still lacks access to modern electricity
      • 3 billion people rely on wood, coal, charcoal or animal waste for cooking and heating


      • Energy is the dominant contributor to climate change, accounting for around 60 per cent of total global greenhouse gas emissions


      • Reducing the carbon intensity of energy is a key objective in long-term climate goals

    • Undesirable Progress URL

      Progress in every area of sustainable energy falls short of what is needed to achieve energy access for all and to meet targets for renewable energy and energy efficiency.

      • Globally, 85.3 per cent of the population had access to electricity in 2014, an increase of only 0.3 percentage points since 2012. That means that 1.06 billion people, predominantly rural dwellers, still function without electricity. Half of those people live in sub-Saharan Africa.
      • Access to clean fuels and technologies for cooking climbed to 57.4 per cent in 2014, up slightly from 56.5 per cent in 2012. More than 3 billion people, the majority of them in Asia and sub-Saharan Africa, are still cooking without clean fuels and more efficient technologies.
      • The share of renewable energy in final energy consumption grew modestly from 2012 to 2014, from 17.9 per cent to 18.3 per cent. Most of the increase was from renewable electricity from water, solar and wind power. Solar and wind power still make up a relatively minor share of energy consumption, despite their rapid growth in recent years. The challenge is to increase the share of renewable energy in the heat and transport sectors, which together account for 80 per cent of global energy consumption.
      • From 2012 to 2014, three quarters of the world’s 20 largest energy-consuming countries had reduced their energy intensity — the ratio of energy used per unit of GDP. The reduction was driven mainly by greater efficiencies in the industry and transport sectors. However, that progress is still not sufficient to meet the target of doubling the global rate of improvement in energy efficiency.

    • Trends & Progress URL

      • Sustainable energy in developing countries often faces technical, informational, financial, and regulatory barriers. In pre-market conditions, as is the case in many of the poorest countries and communities, these barriers can act as an immediate setback.
      • Under these conditions, special attention is given to early market creation, through piloting new business models, promoting productive uses of energy and providing business development and incubation support. This support can lay the foundation for an emerging, functioning energy market, and has the greatest potential for poverty reduction and economic and human development.
      • Main principle: Leaving no one behind

      Leaving no one behind:
      Energy for humanitarian response and sustainable development

      • A broad coalition of governments, international organizations, businesses and civil society groups on Monday joined forces at the United Nations to call for and consider urgent action to address the substantial energy needs of refugees and displaced people worldwide. 

      • The assembled organizations agreed that access to clean and sustainable energy can transform broken lives, create empowering opportunities, and bridge the humanitarian-development divide by improving livelihoods, food security and nutrition, health, safety, education and the environment. At the event, the leaders committed to develop new partnerships, to share information, and to continue to meet to report on future progress on the integration of sustainable energy solutions into humanitarian responses. 

    • UNDP URL

      UNDP Support to the Implementation

      Three main action areas:

      • UNDP’s policy and programme support in the area of sustainable energy for the period of 2017-2021 encompasses three interlinked action areas: reducing the energy access gap, increasing the share of renewable energy in the energy mix and improving the rate of energy efficiency.
      • Across all three areas, UNDP’s support to national governments will include a comprehensive package of technical assistance at the policy and institutional levels as well as on-the-ground investments ranging from local community-level support to nationwide efforts.

      Guiding principles for UNDP's work on sustainable energy

      Principles

      Explanations

      1. Context matters

      UNDP recognizes that each country faces unique energy challenges to its development objectives and offers a suite of services tailored to each county’s context.

      2. Deployment policies for technologies and applications

      UNDP focuses on creating the conditions for scaling up the use of technologies, covering the full range of clean energy technologies. UNDP recognizes that the technology mix needed to decarbonize the energy sector will evolve as technological innovations mature and move to market readiness, and as social and environmental concerns associated with some solutions (e.g. nuclear energy) are met with proper response measures.

      3. Promotion of sustainable energy sources

      UNDP promotes the use of renewable sources such as wind, solar, biomass and small hydro as well as energy efficiency and switching fuels towards a zero-carbon energy system in the future.

      4. Integration of social, economic and environmental dimensions

      UNDP’s work ensures inclusion of the most vulnerable groups and protection of the environment.

      5. Climate and disaster risk-informed

      UNDP will work with countries to integrate climate and disaster risk into energy sector interventions to build resilience and to safeguard future gains.

      6. Technical excellence

      UNDP will provide governments with best-in-class technical support and expertise, with thought-leadership and high-quality methodologies.

      7. From global to local

      With decades of implementation experience, supported by its convening role and responsibility that stretches from local to global levels, UNDP will continue to facilitate sharing of knowledge and lessons learned across regions including through South-South and triangular cooperation.



    • Case studies URL

      Regional collaborations

      Collaborations North East Asia Aim to Boost Renewable Energy Deployment, Energy Efficiency

      North East Asian countries (Japan, S Korea, China, Russia and Mongolia) establish regional mechanism for energy integration.

      • Collaboration among neighboring countries is key to advance renewable energy development as countries in many regions must integrate their electrical grids and coordinate renewable energy expansion to keep electricity supplies stable and efficient. 
      • Pursuing similar objectives including reducing energy cost, and increasing energy efficiency and grid stability, the group of North-East Asian countries has agreed to establish a regional mechanism for energy integration. The North-East Asia Regional Power Interconnection and Cooperation Forum (NEA-RPIC) will meet annually to facilitate information sharing and promote coordination among stakeholders. The initiative was launched during a conference on North-East Asia Regional Power Interconnection, organized by the UN Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific (UNESCAP) and partners.


      http://www.eria.org/RPR_FY2015_09.pdf



      National programme

      UNDP & India: Partnering to Leave No One Behind


      Local community cases

      Honduran Women Light the Way 

      A partnership between the Barefoot College, the Government of India and UNDP´s Small Grants Programme enabled "solar engineers" to bring energy to their community.

      • Yet Iris Marlene Espinal, Carmen Lourdes Zambrano Cruz, Alnora Casy Estrada and Ingrid Miranda Martinez are engineering an energy secure future. They all from remote corners of Honduras, are leading efforts to install, maintain and repair solar energy equipment in their communities. So far they’ve installed more than 200 panels, each generating 85 watts of power for household and other uses.
      • The women learned their skills through the solar energy programme at the Barefoot College in Tilonia, India. Their six-month “solar engineers” study programme was made possible through a partnership between the Government of India and the Small Grants Programme (SGP), a programme supported by the Global Environment Fund (GEF) and UNDP.
      https://stories.undp.org/honduran-women-light-the-way



      • “In addition to providing us with light, we can use the radio and TV,” says 69-year-old Juanita Zambrano from Los Hornos. “We can also charge our cell phones and bulbs. We can listen to the news, read the Bible, talk… and we have less risk of fire.”
      • “We didn’t have any diplomas like students at a normal university,” says Alnora Casy. “In India, we learnt using a practical approach. We brought back a lot of knowledge to benefit our communities and, in a sense, to help them to escape from poverty.”
      • “Without any light our children cannot study at home,” says Juanita from Los Hornos. “We now sleep at nine and the children can study at night.”

    • 7 challenges to achieving sustainable energy URL

      The seven areas for policy advances that Kyte highlighted as priorities if we are to achieve the international community’s goals for 2030 are as follows:

      • First, we have made progress in identifying the one billion people without access to electricity, but we need to develop business models to deliver electricity to them, including by identifying the “missing middle” level for finance.
      • Second, progress in increasing energy productivity should be a priority, and requires a total government approach with support from the highest levels. On this issue, she said efforts to enhance industrial-use efficiency, use efficiency of new buildings, retrofiting existing buildings, and increased appliance efficiency should be addressed.
      • Third, on carbon capture, storage and/or use, she said policy around carbon use is the most exciting area for attention.
      • Fourth, the coal mining vocation encompasses cultural advantages, and policy attention to coal should be focused on identifying transition policies that will address the needs of coal mining communities.
      • Fifth, on finance, she highlighted the need for infrastructure finance and said one challenge is for development banks to be more risk tolerant. She rejected the idea that underperforming pension funds could be unlocked to provide such funding, and highlighted a recent SEforALL publication titled, ‘Energizing Finance,’ which finds that only half of the needed finance to achieve SDG 7 is flowing.
      • Sixth, Kyte said mindsets, institutions and transparency should be addressed. She noted that country planning for achieving the SDGs and the nationally determined contributions (NDCs) under the Paris Agreement on climate change are better than the previous generation of national plans, and highlighted that countries have been able to learn from their neighbors. She stressed the need for policy coherence, including through the reduction of subsidies, to allow developing countries to make progress. She also emphasized that investors, shareholders and regulators need to be on the same page.
      • Seventh, Kyte stressed the importance of pursuing policies that embrace the principles of universality and inclusivity, and noted the need to consider how services could be bundled for the poor and to ensure that services reach women.
      • In conclusion, Kyte said “time is our enemy,” and we have no time to lose. 

    • The priorities for making that future a reality URL

      On June 8 2016, Asia Clean Energy Forum 2016, Ms. Kyte reiterated the priorities for making that future a reality:

      1. Putting efficiency first
      2. Putting access at the heart of any clean energy transition
      3. Developing coherent policy that sends consistent price signals
      4. Understanding the risks and planning for them
      5. Leaving no one behind.

      Ms. Kyte called for an extraordinary new era of action that will turn the promise of technological revolution into a clean energy transformation.


    • Unlocking a clean energy future for Asia: Challenges and opportunities URL

      • Over the past decade, Asia has made huge strides in economic growth and poverty reduction accounting for 28.3 per cent of global gross domestic product (GDP) in 2011. While ongoing economic growth is expected to see developing Asia’s share of the world’s energy consumption rise from 34 per cent in 2010 to over 50 per cent by 2035, most of the increase in consumption will come from fossil fuels. This will lead to an emission level of greenhouse gases of about 20 billion tonnes out of a total global cap of between 22 billion and 30 billion tonnes which is the threshold to avoid a catastrophic tipping point in the climate system. Clearly, this level of emissions is not sustainable for the planet. Asia needs to change its development paradigm to use less energy per unit output, thereby requiring less primary energy overall, as well as to generate more renewable energy within that lowered energy requirement scenario, in order to further limit greenhouse gas emissions.
      • Also problematic is the ability of the region to deliver power to all. Despite impressive economic growth, some 600 million people in the Asia-Pacific region still lack access to electricity. If the policies of governments in developing Asia do not focus on affordable access, then around 330 million Asians could still be without electricity in 2035.
      • The challenge for Asia, therefore, is twofold. We must fuel the region’s continued economic growth to increase living standards, by engaging in an energy strategy that is low-carbon and environmentally sustainable. At the same time, to make growth sustainable and beneficial to all, Asia must increase its energy access investments. Asia can do this only by embracing the three “I”s – to become more innovative, inclusive, and integrated.

    • SDG 7 - Team Discussion Forum

      This forum will host the team discussion where they develop their ideas and plans for SDG 7.

      Interaction and feedback both within the team, and between the teams, should help further develop proposed ideas.

      Topic questions

      1. Share your own understanding of SDG 7, regarding to some practical cases of how the energy are becoming cleaner and more affordable at multiple geographical levels (in your local community, in your country, and in the region).
        .
      2. According to your group’s specific context: What are the most critical issues, significant factors and major principles that have had, are having or will have great influences on transforming future paradigm of energy production and consumption? (For example: technology innovations on both ends; workable business model and financing strategies; flexible governance mode, institutional settings and policy packages; citizen’s sustainable mindsets and lifestyles changing; etc.)
        .
      3. From global to local, as well as from local to global. What are the success experiences from all over the world that can be learned and adopt in SA and SEA? How could your diversified local practices enrich and provide more opportunities to the world in a sense?

      NOTE: this discussion forum activity will close automatically on June 2, so get your contributions posted before that date!

Sustainable Cities and Communities (SDG 11)►