Sustainable Production and Consumption of Energy: Developments Since the 1992 Rio Summit

January 2003
Citation:
33
ELR 10033
Issue
1
Author
Lynn Price & Mark Levine

Introduction

Energy is a fundamental component of myriad services and benefits to humanity in pursuit of a healthy and productive life, including production of food and other essential goods; provision of buildings for housing, education, health care, and commerce; and provision of transportation for goods and people. However, production and consumption of fossil fuel-based energy, which accounts for approximately 85% of total energy consumption in the United States1 can also result in scarring or pollution of the environment during extraction of the fuels and contributes to local air pollution and smog formation, regional acid rain production, and global warming as the fuels are burned. Further, continued large-scale consumption of nonrenewable energy sources will eventually lead to depletion of these resources and future generations will need to rely on alternative sources of energy. Thus, the significant characteristics of sustainable development for the energy sector include more efficient use of nonrenewable fossil fuel-based energy resources, development of technologies to significantly reduce local and global pollutants from fossil fuels, and increased development and use of renewable energy resources.

This Article looks at the characteristics of sustainable development vis-a-vis energy consumption and production, reviews the laws and policies enacted in the United States that could contribute to more sustainable energy consumption and production, and evaluates actual achievements in three areas that measure sustainability of energy consumption and production. We find that although there are many guiding principles relevant to energy sustainability and there have been numerous energy-related laws and policies enacted both prior to and after the 1992 Rio Declaration on Environment and Development,2 growth in fossil fuel-based energy use as well as in energy-related greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions was more rapid—and thus less sustainable—in the eight years after 1992 than in the two decades prior to Rio. We recommend a comprehensive package of policies and measures that includes carbon fees, increased research and development (R&D), expanded efficiency standards, building codes, tax credits for energy efficiency and renewable energy investments, expanded government procurement programs, negotiated agreements with industries to improve energy intensity of manufacturing, increased information dissemination, promotion of combined heat and power, increased fuel efficiency standards for vehicles, etc. A recent study that analyzed the combined impact of this comprehensive package found that, if very aggressive policies were introduced in all sectors and significant research and development breakthroughs occurred in the transportation sector, it might be possible to reduce energy-related carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions to 1990 levels by 2020.

[Editors' Note: In June 1992, at the United Nations Conference on Environment and Development (UNCED) in Rio de Janeiro, the nations of the world formally endorsed the concept of sustainable development and agreed to a plan of action for achieving it. One of those nations was the United States. In August 2002, at the World Summit on Sustainable Development, these nations gathered in Johannesburg to review progress in the 10-year period since UNCED and to identify steps that need to be taken next. Prof. John C. Dernbach has edited a book, Stumbling Toward Sustainability, that assesses progress made by the United States on sustainable development in the past 10 years and recommends next steps. The book, published by the Environmental Law Institute in July 2002, is comprised of chapters on various subjects by experts from around the country. This Article appears as a chapter in that book. Further information on Stumbling Toward Sustainability will be available at www.eli.org or by calling 1-800-433-5120 or 202-939-3844.]

Lynn Price is a Scientist and Deputy Group Leader in the International Energy Studies Group, Energy Analysis Department of the Environmental Energy Technologies Division at the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory. She can be contacted at 1 Cyclotron Rd., MS 90-4000, Berkeley CA 94720, USA. Mark Levine is Division Director of the Environmental Energy Technologies Division at the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory. He can be contacted at 1 Cyclotron Rd., MS 90-3026, Berkeley CA 94720, USA. The authors would like to acknowledge the significant assistance of Michal Landau, a 2001 summer student at Berkeley lab, in gathering data and information for this Article.

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