section one
Clean and safe renewable energy, coupled with a much-increased implementation of energy efficiency, can provide the power needed to run the planet and avoid the risks of pushing us ever closer to catastrophic climate change. That is abundantly clear from the astounding progress in the development of renewable energy over the past decade. In 2011, renewable energy provided over 30% of new electricity production globally, up from less than 5% in 2005.19 This explosive growth can continue and is by far the best hope for avoiding the most serious impacts of climate change. The global renewable-energy scenario developed by Greenpeace – the Energy [R]evolution – shows how to deliver the power and mobility the dirty projects are promising, without the emissions and the destruction; not only faster, but also at a lower cost.20 The scenario indicates that by 2035 renewable energy must increase to 65% of electricity production, and energy efficiency must increase to reduce the impact the world is already seeing from climate change and to avoid the catastrophe of a global average temperature increase of 4°C to 6ºC. The world cannot afford to allow the major new coal projects detailed in this report to go ahead and lock in decades of dirty electricity production, or to allow the oil projects to delay the shift to more sustainable transport systems.
The Greenpeace scenario shows that by 2020 renewable energy could deliver twice as much power as the combined output of the four coal projects highlighted in this report.21 More efficient cars, plus a switch to cleaner fuels and a much smarter use of energy in power generation, buildings and industry, could save more oil than the seven massive oil projects featured in this report could produce.22 There would be no need to exploit the oil and gas in the fragile Arctic if the world adopted a clean energy future. The clean energy future made possible by the dramatic development of renewable energy will only become a reality if governments rein in investments in dirty fossil fuels and support renewable energy. The world is clearly at a Point of No Return: either replace coal, oil and gas with renewable energy, or face a future turned upside down by climate change.
“A handful of governments and a small number of companies in the fossil fuel industry are pushing these projects, apparently without a care about the climate consequences.” Point of No Return The massive climate threats we must avoid
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