Objectives
to achieve Sustainable Energy for All
Developed countries face the combined challenge and opportunity of transforming existing infrastructure, and developing countries have the opportunity to adopt cleaner, more efficient technology from the start. These three objectives reinforce each other in many instances, and achieving the three together will power opportunity, maximize development benefits and help stabilize climate change.
Sustainable energy powers opportunity. Yet 1.3 billion people—one in five globally—lack electricity to light their homes or conduct business. Twice that number—nearly 40% of the world's population—rely on wood, coal, charcoal, or animal waste to cook their food—breathing in toxic smoke that causes lung disease and kills nearly two million people a year, most of them women and children.
Without access to modern energy, it is not possible to achieve the Millennium Development Goals, the eight-point global agenda adopted by the United Nations in 2000—whether reducing poverty, improving women's and children's health, or broadening the reach of education.
Investing in energy efficiency creates jobs, fosters economic growth and improves energy security for countries that lack domestic fossil fuel resources.
Of the three objectives of Sustainable Energy for All, improving energy efficiency has the clearest impact on saving money, improving business results, and delivering more services for consumers—better refrigerators that cost the same but use less energy; new vehicle designs that travel further on less fuel; and buildings that require less energy to heat and cool.
Energy from renewable resources—wind, water, the sun, biomass and geothermal energy—is inexhaustible and clean. The costs of technologies to capture that energy are rapidly falling and becoming economically competitive with fossil fuels, while reducing the risk of climate change.
Renewable energy currently constitutes 15% of the global energy mix. Achieving the Secretary-General's objective of doubling that percentage by 2030 requires support from all sectors of society, including individuals. Renewable energy products and services constitute a rapidly growing segment of the international marketplace.