Externe Publikationen

Sustainable energy supply – what is it about?

Ruchser, Matthias
Externe Publikationen (2015)

in: Diplomatisches Magazin 8/2015, 36-39

The General Assembly of the United Nations in September 2015 will likely determine the Post-2015 Agenda with new, universal goals, the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). Columbia and Guatemala submitted the proposal for the development of new sustainability goals before the United Nations Conference on Sustainable Development, also referred to as Rio+20, which took place in Rio de Janeiro in June 2012. The United Nations therefore appointed an Open Working Group (OWG). It presented its proposal for 17 goals and 169 targets for sustainable development within the framework of the Post-2015 Agenda at the end of July 2014. The goals call for the end of poverty and hunger, for gender equality, sustainable energy supply, protection of the climate and the environment, and a reduction in inequality within and among the states. What is new about the SDGs is that they are universal and apply to all: industrial, developing and emerging countries.

The sustainability goal number seven calls for the access to affordable, reliable, sustainable and modern energy for all by 2030. This ties SDG 7 in to the ‘International Year of Sustainable Energy for All’ (SE4All), declared by the United Nations in 2012. The industrial, developing and emerging countries are called upon to increase substantially the share of renewable energy in the global energy mix and to double the global rate of improvement in energy efficiency by 2030. The article answers the question, what is affordable, reliable, sustainable and modern energy?