Ernest G. Moniz quickly got to the point. "The intertwined energy challenges we face today—energy demand growth, climate change, economic development, energy security, global population growth, and urbanization—call for a whole range of policy and technology options for their simultaneous resolution," the US Secretary of Energy said in a Nov. 21 keynote address to the Atlantic Council's 2013 Energy & Economic Summit in Istanbul.
His message didn't seem much different from what he had said a few weeks before at the Center for Strategic & International Studies in Washington. It merely sounded more urgent.
"Clearly, countries need and demand energy for health, education, security, and wealth creation," Moniz said. "These aspirations translate directly into what well may be a soaring global energy demand, most of it occurring in the developing world for much needed economic development."
China may be the extreme example, since its gross domestic product increased seventyfold over 4 decades $8 trillion from $112 billion, with a corresponding increased demand on the world's energy resources, he continued. It now is the leading oil importing country, and its 4 billion tons/year represents half of total global coal demand, Moniz said.
"I was in China a few weeks ago, and could literally see the spillover effect into pollution," he said. "The particulate matter, PM 2.5, was a factor of 30 above the Environmental Protection Agency limit in the United States and other countries' similar limits."
Moniz told his Istanbul audience countries in "this region—traditionally one of the world's largest sources of energy exports—will increasingly need energy resources domestically to meet needs as their economies grow."
Prudence demands action
He said the flip-side of this energy demand imperative is global climate impacts, a subject he doesn't care to debate. "The risks of climate change are real and urgent, and prudence demands strong, commonsense, near-term policy actions to minimize the risks of global warming," Moniz declared.
Conceding that no single extreme weather event can be attributed to climate change, he said it's nevertheless apparent that sea levels are rising and the severity of droughts, storms, and heat waves is increasing.
"Indeed, halfway across the world, the Philippines faces a long recovery from possibly the strongest typhoon ever to make landfall, driven in part by the warming waters in the Pacific," Moniz said.
Producing abundant US shale oil and gas is compatible with recognizing the need to reduce emissions and address climate change, he indicated. "We need to pursue low-carbon solutions that have the marketplace option of using all sources of fuels and technologies," Moniz said. "They will need to be implemented different ways in different places."
