With nearly half of its one billion citizens without a secure electricity supply, India faces many difficult social and environmental challenges as its economy develops in the new century. Currently over 40,000 villages and communities lack access to the national grid, suffering poor health, pollution, and poverty as a result.
Innovative local renewable energy solutions are [...]

GVEP International has just published a Policy Briefing on innovative finance mechanisms and how they could be used to scale up investments in low carbon technologies in Africa. The two case studies examined were presented at a DFID sponsored policy conference at Chatham House in London on 28th January.
Large investments will need to be made [...]

The China Low Carbon Platform (CLCP) has been launched this week. CLCP is a new knowledge-sharing platform for low carbon energy and low carbon development for China. The aim of CLCP is to disseminate and share information in Chinese and English on low carbon energy systems and low carbon development strategies that reduce poverty and [...]

GVEP International investigates the potential of Jatropha to improve livelihoods in Zambia where 96% of rural households survive on less than 1 USD per day.
The Jatropha Curcas is a useful shrub. It is drought-resistant, requires less intensive management and can live for 50 years. It grows up to 5 metres in height and its leaves [...]

A new report from GVEP-I sets out to tackle the question of why the adoption of improved cook stoves has been so slow in developing countries.
GVEP International has produced a report compiling a series of articles written by key stakeholders active in the promotion, dissemination and marketing of cookstoves globally.
The main purpose of the report [...]

‘Briquettes’ are proving to be a potential alternative to the standard use of environmentally damaging fuels such as firewood, kerosene and charcoal in the Rongo district of Kenya.
Through the Developing Energy Enterprises Project (DEEP) East Africa, GVEP International along with partner organizations in Uganda, Tanzania and Kenya are looking at various ways of supporting the [...]

A study, prepared by some of the nation’s top climate change policy advisers, proposes that with the right policies emissions growth could slow by 2020 with levels peaking around 2030. “As soon as possible, study and draft relative and then absolute targets to cap the total volume of carbon dioxide emissions,” says the preface of the report, obtained by Reuters. “Establishing and acting on quantified targets and corresponding policies to address climate change in the medium to long-term is already a matter of great urgency.” The call for “quantified targets” to cap greenhouse gas pollution marks a high-level public departure from China’s reluctance to spell out a proposed peak and date for it. This also signals that Beijing wants to play an active role in seeking agreement for a new international climate change pact.

A week-long negotiations toward a new global response to climate change concluded in Bonn Friday. Negotiators get down to practicalities in the areas of adaptation, technology and capacity building. Some progress was also made in narrowing options in the negotiating text. “So with only 15 days of negotiating time left before Copenhagen, negotiations will need to considerably pick up speed for the world to achieve a successful result at Copenhagen,” Yvo de Boer, UN climate chief, said. Governments also discussed how 2020 emission reduction pledges of industrialized countries could be translated into legally binding targets as a key component of the Copenhagen deal. “Industrialized countries need to show a greater level of ambition in agreeing to meaningful mid-term emission reduction targets,” de Boer said. “We also need a clear indication of the finance and technology industrialized countries are ready to provide to help developing countries green their economic growth and adapt to the impacts of climate change,” said de Boer.

Some 365 wind turbines will be installed in desert around Lake Turkana in northern Kenya to create the biggest wind farm in Africa. Once completed in 2012, the farm will have a capacity of 300 megawatts. The £533 million (USD895 million) project, backed by the African Development Bank, will have a quarter of Kenya’s current installed power and one of the highest proportions of wind energy to be fed in a national grid anywhere in the world. The German consortium working on the project has leased 66,000 hectares of the world’s largest permanent desert lake. Extreme temperatures generate extreme winds and this is the reason wind farms have great potential in Africa.

The United States could save about USD600 billion in energy costs by 2020 if it hiked annual efficiency spending about five-fold, McKinsey and Co said in a report, according to Reuters. Governments, businesses and the general public would have to boost annual spending on existing energy-saving measures from about USD10 billion annually to 50 billion per year or in all 520 billion by 2020. The upfront costs would pay off by saving USD1.2 trillion by 2020, according to the report. The reduction in energy use would also result in the abatement of 1.1 gigatons of greenhouse gas emissions annually – the equivalent of taking the entire U.S. fleet of passenger vehicles and light trucks off the roads. Such savings will be possible, however, only if the U.S. can overcome significant barriers, which require an integrated set of solutions – including information and education, incentives and financing, codes and standards, and deployment resources well beyond current levels.