Sustainability, the only solutions are nuclear power and renewables

According to Fatih Birol, chief economist of the International Energy

Fatih Birol - head of economic studies of the International Energy Agency and supervisor of IEA's annual World Energy Outlook - probably catalogues, analyzes and synthesizes more energy data than anyone else in the world.

For years he has supervised IEA's analyses focused on sustainable energy, a subject on which he has now clear convictions. Which he frequently expresses, like he did recently, during the Sustainability Day that Enel organized in February in Rome.

Birol recalls that all discussions on energy sustainability must take account three challenges: climate change, energy security, the availability of energy for the over 1.5 billion people who don't even have access to electricity.

In order to overcome these three barriers, the only currently available solutions are nuclear energy and renewables.

Technological advances are rapidly changing the cost of energy sources and today (with oil at over $80 per barrel, a price that is unlikely to fall over the coming years, says Birol) the cost of renewable power is already aligned with that produced from fossil fuels. This is true not only for hydropower, but also for wind, though the latter currently only under the favourable conditions existing in northern Europe. Geothermal energy is also undergoing innovation at a fast rate and soon this source will become more economic than many others.

Regarding renewables, however, Birol underlines that incentives must be a temporary solution, and that it is urgent that they be gradually downsized compared to recent years. Also because an excessive amount of resources devoted to the promotion of a number of technologies for electricity generation could reduce energy efficiency investments, which are more effective for emissions reduction targets. Therefore, at a certain point, over-promoting renewable energy in the current market could produce negative effects on the main objective, which is the abatement of CO2 emissions.

According to Birol, though, the full competitiveness of renewables will only result from further technological progress or the (sufficiently heavy) taxation of CO2 emissions.

In order to reduce global emissions, IEA's chief economist also emphasized the importance of flexible exchange mechanisms, such as those introduced by the Kyoto Protocol. But from a technological point of view, he particularly recommends to aim at hydroelectric (whenever this is still possible), geothermal, clean coal (since global consumption will increasingly rely on this fuel in the coming decades) and nuclear power.

On this last point Birol is particularly clear: "only nuclear power can generate electricity on a large scale with close to zero CO2 emissions. Hydropower is the only other comparable source, but it has a limited potential".