According to current rates of consumption, the known reserves of fossil energy sources, which can be accessed and exploited according to demand and at costs compatible with the current market prices, will be exhausted within forty years for oil, within seventy years for gas and within than two centuries for coal. Such a relative margin of security of supply in the middle-term should not mask the fact that fossil energy resources are non-renewable and exist only in a limited quantity. These precious energy reserves, an essential element of humanity's capital, are slowly but surely being used up, and the integrity of the local and global environment has long been threatened by the abusive over-use of fossil fuels.

The world's population is doubling. Within fifty years there will be 9 to 11 billion inhabitants on the planet. The energy revolution, which will happen, must be a revolution of our mentalities and behaviour. An energy policy for a sustainable future cannot simply consist in an extrapolation based on a "business as usual" policy.

Without any radical change in energy policy, fossil energy resources, such as oil, gas and coal will continue to represent close to 80 % of the world energetic needs in the 21^st century. Their exploitation will irreversibly threaten the world climatic balance. In addition to considerations of price, environmental concerns and supply security can act as powerful forces to reorientate the world energy system. For most commodities in the market economy, prices are a reflection of cost. In the domain of energy, such a reality does not exist. At present, financial and institutional barriers, together with imposed regulations, are insuperable obstacles for the development of viable renewable energy alternatives even in developed countries. Direct and indirect governmental grants to fossil and nuclear energy industries are serious obstacles to the development of renewable energy resources. The support granted to the production of non-renewable energies is an obstacle to the acceleration of energy efficiency.

However, the most important financial discrepancy in the fossil and nuclear energy market is the lack of direct consideration for the damage costs that their exploitation imposes on the environment and public health, the expense of which is already being realised but will be even more so in the future. The market price of fossil fuels does not include the cost and effects that the emissions and waste products produced will have on future generations. New economic standards must be put in place in order to ensure a sustainable future for humanity.

A sustainable economy must respect the limits of the ecological system of the planet. These are limits fixed by the long term availability of the non renewable resources, such as ore and fossil energy resources, of the renewable biological resources and of the renewable energy resources derived from the sun, wind and water. The other limits are fixed by the capacity of the biosphere to assimilate the waste issued from human activity. The current development process tends to ignore such limits and, in the domain of energy, these have already been overstepped.

A sustainable economy must ensure to all the inhabitants of the planet an equitable and fair distribution of renewable or non renewable resources in the long-run, taking into consideration the finite ability of the world environment to accommodate our waste.

The economic development experienced by the northern countries is driving the world towards a dead-end. Ten to twelve billion inhabitants will never be able to live like the average American; even the natural resources of five Earths would be insufficient. The world economy must acknowledge and integrate the fact that the biosphere is limited in its capacity to provide renewable and non renewable resources and to assimilate the waste.

Two key realities should underpin the recommendations of this important conference:

• The threats posed by global climate change
• The urgent needs of the rural poor for basic energy services

If the world is to meet the objectives of the Framework Convention on Climate Change and its Kyoto Protocol — to eventually stabilize atmospheric CO2 at the 1990 level (about 350 ppm) - it will have to dramatically reduce net industrial emissions — some calculations conclude to zero - over the next 60 years. Today about 80% of electricity is generated from fossil fuels; this has to be reduced to about 25% or less over the next 50 years.

It is clear that the world can not afford to burn its proven reserves of coal, oil and gas.

Green Cross International suggests that the final recommendations of the Conference should include the following concrete proposals:

• Governments and Intergovernmental Development Agencies, such as the World bank, should contribute towards bringing clean energy services to the approximately 2 billion poor people, mainly in rural areas, who currently lack basic energy services;
• The same Development Agencies should set an initial benchmark of 20% of their total energy portfolio for investments in alternative and renewable energy, demand-side management and energy efficiency programs;
• The cost of CO2 emissions isn’t zero. In analysing projects, and certainly prior to financing them, it is necessary to internalize CO2 costs by using shadow-pricing. If the internal rate of return of a project being evaluated is reduced significantly because of the shadow-pricing exercise, using the GEF’s present screening figure of $25/t, that should trigger a much more aggressive analysis of alternatives.