Balancing the world’s growing needs for energy services against
our collective need for a healthy environment lies at the heart of the
sustainable development challenge. Access to modern, reliable and affordable
energy supplies is an essential prerequisite for combating poverty, but
at present, more than a third of the world’s population lacks access
to even the most basic energy supplies and services. At the same time,
the prodigious use of fossil fuels in industrialized and rapidly developing
nations is responsible for an array of serious environmental and public
health threats, ranging from indoor and local-scale air pollution to global-scale
climate change. In the coming decades, it is expected that energy usage
will steeply rise, especially in developing countries; all nations bear
responsibility to develop and adopt new approaches for meeting these demands
while protecting ecological and human health. Ongoing R&D efforts
are absolutely critical for meeting this challenge.
Sustainable
Development
