Energiewende and Innovation: Are we Transitioning Fast Enough?

February 2020, Session Brief for WSDF 2020
Author(s): Shonali Pachauri and Shailly Kedia

Key Questions >>>

  • Can Energiewendeserve as a useful framework for both developed and developing countries?
  • What are the gaps in Energiewendedriven responses in the current situation? What needs to be done to address these gaps? Which institutions need to be further strengthened and which actors need to be further empowered?
  • What innovation and research agenda is required for Energiewendeworldwide?
  • How can Energiewendehelp in fulfilling modern energy needs in developing countries to meet the targets under Goal 7 while maximizing co-benefits with other targets of the Sustainable Development Goals?

Introduction

In 2000, the Energiewende, a term that literally means the energy transition or revolution, began in Germany as a bottom-up movement when legislators were persuaded by grassroots campaigners to support renewable energy growth through feed-in tariffs (Buchan 2012). Through the years, policies and foci have expanded and so have the number of countries that have undertaken actions towards an Energiewende. It is now also embedded in the ambitious European energy and climate policy framework. However, several challenges remain. Within Germany as well, Energiewende is under question. This is because the country is off course to meeting its 2020 emissions reduction targets, and longer-term goals look uncertain as well. Despite these challenges, Germany remains a front-runner in initiating an ambitious Energiewende.

Today, Energiewende, is a term used globally. It refers to the fundamental transformations necessary in the way we source, produce, distribute and use energy in order to meet climate goals and protect our planet. While the initial focus of the German policy, that heralded the use of the term, was on decarbonizing the economy and moving away from nuclear energy, Energiewende today is more comprehensively understood as essential to achieve multiple purposes. Fighting climate change is still considered the primary imperative. However, reducing energy imports and increasing energy security, fostering innovation and green growth, reducing the risks of nuclear power, and strengthening community engagement and local economies are critical additional reasons why governments are initiating policies towards an Energiewende.

Is the transition occurring rapidly while also expanding access?

Fossil greenhouse gas emissions from energy use and industry, which dominate total GHG emissions, grew 2 per cent in 2018, reaching a record 37.5 GtCO2 per year (UNEP 2019). Overall, progress towards decarbonizing the world economy has been inadequate, though there are encouraging signs in some countries of increasing efforts towards decarbonizing their economies. The world is also not on track to meet the energy transition related targets encapsulated in Goal 7 of the Sustainable Development Goals, which calls for ensuring “access to affordable, reliable, sustainable and modern energy for all” by 2030 (IEA, IRENA, UNSD and WB 2019). While pronounced progress in expanding access to electricity has been made in several countries in recent years, Sub-Saharan Africa remains a region with a large access deficit and where progress is slower than required to meet the target. Access to clean fuels and technologies for cooking has been expanded in several countries, but globally the number of people dependent on polluting solid fuels remain unchanged since over a decade because population growth has outpaced the rate of which access is being provided.

Performance in renewables and energy efficiency

In 2016, the share of modern renewables (that is, excluding traditional uses of bioenergy for cooking and heating) in total energy consumption reached 10.2%, up from 8.6% in 2010 (IEA, IRENA, UNSD, WB, 2019). The use of renewables to generate electricity has increased rapidly since 2010, but the share of renewables in heat and transport sectors remains very low. A substantial further increase of renewable energy is needed across all sectors of the economy for achieving rapid decarbonization. Energy efficiency improvements have also increased steadily in recent years, thanks to strong policies in major economies, like China. However, the global rate of improvement in primary energy intensity still lags behind the SDG target, and estimates suggest that improvements slowed in 2017 and 2018 (IEA, IRENA, UNSD, WB, 2019). Decarbonization of the global energy system through a major up-scaling of renewables and energy efficiency efforts is needed to dramatically cut emissions.

Transition options for countries

The UNEP Gap report highlights five transition options with clear co-benefits for other developmental goals (UNEP 2019). These include:

  • Expanding Renewable Energy for electrification
  • Phasing out coal for rapid decarbonization of the energy system
  • Decarbonizing transport with a focus on electric mobility
  • Decarbonizing energy-intensive industry
  • Avoiding future emissions while improving energy access
  • Maximizing synergies with other Sustainable Development Goals (SDG)

The Energiewende must be implemented in a way that maximizes co-benefits with other SDG and avoids potential trade-offs. This also implies that the energy transition needs to be just, inclusive and equitable.  Policies must be designed such that they take an integrated and holistic perspective of multiple policy objectives. While increasing energy access has a wide range of benefits across multiple SDG, decarbonizing energy systems by promoting renewables and increasing energy efficiency could cause price shocks, and so prevent universal access to modern energy supplies. Because some of the poorest parts of the world have some of the highest renewable energy potential, making use of this potential could help to reduce poverty. Deploying renewables and energy-efficient technologies should be done in ways that encourage innovation and reinforce local, regional and national industrial and employment objectives (ICSU 2017).

The future Energiewende needs to occur much more rapidly than the pace of historical energy transitions that have occurred rather gradually in the past. This also requires much faster paced technological change and innovation and in systemic alignment with actions addressing sustainable development goals. The political, economic, social and technical feasibility of solar energy, wind energy and electricity storage technologies has improved dramatically over the past few years, while that of nuclear energy and carbon dioxide capture and storage (CCS) in the electricity sector have not shown similar improvements (Allen et al. 2018).

Key questions

  • The above review raise the following key questions:
  • Can Energiewendeprovide a useful framework for both developed and developing countries?
  • What are the gaps in Energiewende driven responses in the current situation? What needs to be done to address these gaps? Which institutions need to be further strengthened and which actors need to be further empowered?
  • What innovation and research agenda is required for Energiewende worldwide?
  • How can Energiewende help in fulfilling modern energy needs in developing countries to meet the targets under Goal 7 of the Sustainable Development Goals?

References

Buchan, D. (2012), The Energiewende–Germany’s Gamble, Oxford: Oxford Institute for Energy Studies.

IEA, IRENA, UNSD, WB, WHO (2019), Tracking SDG 7: The Energy Progress Report 2019, Washington DC.

International Council for Science (ICSU) (2017),  A Guide to SDG Interactions: from Science to Implementation [D.J. Griggs, M. Nilsson, A. Stevance, D. McCollum (eds)], Paris: International Council for Science.

R. Allen et al. (2018), Technical Summary. In: Global warming of 1.5°C. An IPCC Special  Report  on  the  impacts  of  global  warming  of  1.5°C above pre-industrial levels and related global greenhouse gas  emission pathways, in the context of strengthening the global response to the threat of climate change, sustainable development, and efforts to eradicate poverty,[V. Masson-Delmotte, P. Zhai, H. O. Pörtner, D. Roberts, J. Skea, P.R. Shukla, A. Pirani, W. Moufouma-Okia, C. Péan, R. Pidcock, S. Connors, J. B. R. Matthews, Y. Chen, X. Zhou, M. I. Gomis, E. Lonnoy, T. Maycock, M. Tignor, T. Waterfield (eds.)], Geneva: Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change.

UNEP (2019), Emissions Gap Report 2019 (Executive Summary), Nairobi: United Nations Environment Programme.

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