Renewable energy sources

Achieving a climate-resilient future requires rapid, sustained and far-reaching transformations in energy, land-use, infrastructure and industrial systems. Large-scale expansion of renewable energy can play a critical role in meeting the world’s growing energy demands and in the fight against climate change. However, even ‘clean’ energy sources can have significant unintended impacts on the environment.

It is generally accepted that human emissions of greenhouse gases upset the thermal balance of earth-atmosphere system and ultimately lead to global climate changes. The extent of the changes will depend on future emissions of greenhouse gases and will vary between the Earth's different regions. But a central estimate for the Nordic region is that, by 2100, the temperature will have increased by about 3 degrees C, average rainfall will be 10% higher and the sea level may have raised 40cm.

The Greening Blue Energy project aims to facilitate well-balanced and science-based discussions on the impacts on the marine environment from offshore renewable energy developments and as such this publication provides a synthesis of current knowledge on the potential biodiversity impacts of offshore wind energy on the marine environment. It is based on scientific evidence and experiences from offshore renewable energy development and other relevant sectors.

Developed through a literature review and individual consultations with experts and validated through an experts' workshop, this white paper considers the  most recent work on the intersection of gender and energy. It intends to demonstrate that gender equality can be a driver for more effective clean energy investments, and that this gender lens can be applied at every level of the energy value chain.

This publication argues that the harnessing of hydrogen and fuel cells will spawn a new economic revolution in the 21st century. The new energy regime has the potential to be sustainable, non-polluting, and to provide a decentralized and democratic source of power.

The concept of Integrated Food and Energy Systems (IFES) as such is not new. Simple integration of food and energy production at both small and large scales has shown many successful results. However, with the increasing complexity of the system, - and hence higher resource use efficiency, the number of successful cases diminishes. Concrete results on wide-scale implementation of more complex IFES are scarce.

From introduction: "WWF has a vision of a world that is powered by 100 per cent renewable energy sources by the middle of this century. Unless we make this transition, the world is most likely to avoid predicted escalating impacts of climate change. But is it possible to achieve 100 per cent renewable energy supplies for everyone by 2050? WWF called on expertise of respected energy consultancy Ecofys to provide an answer this question.

Part 1 of this final report outlines current global environmental problems and serves as an introduction to the entire report. Part 2 gives the results of the Conference discussions. Chapter 1 summarizes the data and reference materials that were submitted to the Conference, and demonstrates how serious current environmental problems are by giving actual data on global warming, loss of biodiversity and others. Chapters 2 and 3 summarize the results of the discussions.

The key message of this publication is that the occurrence of the global economic and financial crisis and the interrelated climate, food, and water crises offers a window of opportunity to embark on a path of more resilient and sustainable economic growth. The key challenge is to avoid responding to the crises with measures that perpetuate economically, socially and environmentally unsustainable production and consumption patterns.