G 20 and the low carbon agenda

Our View :
The G 20 has once again met amid activist protests , expectations and conflicting views with each country surprisingly agreeing to come together in difficult times to commit more funds to the international trade, the IMF and also pay more attention to regulatory mechanisms. The economic problems surrounding the global markets overshadowed all other discussions and agreements on the agenda including those on climate change.
One of the positive developments of the G 20 summit would be if a consensus could be reached on the reported resource allocation of USD 200 billion per year on developing the new low carbon energy sources and scaling them to reach commercially viable solutions.

The major proven alternative energy sources today are the photovoltaic cell solar energy systems and the wind mill based energy systems. Though there is no energy cost in both systems the equipment is cumbersome for mass production and suitable for large scale deployment of tiny units which would require extensive human capital

This was an ideal opportunity to test the utility of the Group of 20 especially because either of the dominant group in the G 20 cannot individually surmount this challenge. The rich G 7 countries could have the finances and the technology for such development but they lack the need for setting up new utilities , or small scale units on a massive scale as they are already energy surplus. They also do not possess the low cost implementation manpower that will ultimately go to reduce the cost per unit. The emerging BRIC economies need the energy and also have the low cost manpower to go ahead with such projects but lack both technology & finance.

It is estimated that such a collaboration could bring the world out of the current recession and also have an explosive employment potential of over 20 million jobs in the next 20 years. However the wrangling over low carbon energy sources does not end in bonhomie seeing the combined advantages of such a collaboration. The big issue is the intent to actually get a mechanism in motion for such a change which is unlikely to happen. Whereas individual companies will move across the multi polar world to build , and benefit from trade, it is highly unlikely in view of the big money lobbies in the energy sectors that too much intergovernmental funds are actually devoted to low cost export of carbon free technology. This is one of the main reasons ewhy this sector is taking so long to crank up despite all the talk about climate change.

We could be wrong. Tell us if we are & why? We encourage diverse opininon even if it is from commercially interested groups opposed to our thinking.