Introduction: Energy Changes

Abstract

Emissions from fossil fuel combustion have major local and global environmental, social, and economic impacts. Progress in reducing emissions has been made by some industrial countries, with, for example, renewable energy systems being widely adopted, and as the economies of the less developed regions of the world begin to expand, they too will have to make changes in energy production and use. This introductory chapter outlines the key energy policy issues and the options for action, with renewables being seen as central, and with the focus of the book being on related development programmes in Africa, for example, under the UN Sustainable Energy for All programme, but also on work on renewables by and in the European Union in the case of Eastern and Central Europe.