Energy Security 1

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En provenance du cours de University of London

Global Energy and Climate Policy

76 notes

University of London

Global Energy and Climate Policy

76 notes

The Global Energy and Climate Policy course offers an introduction to the theoretical and practical understanding of how energy and climate change policies are designed, shaped, advocated and implemented. As energy markets go truly global, domestic energy policies are becoming more and more entangled with wider issues of international governance. Concurrently, the urgent need to mitigate and adapt to climate change and transition to a low-carbon future is adding a further layer of complexity. The course is aimed broadly at people interested in learning more about interconnected issues in energy and climate policy globally. It assumes a level of interest but no necessary previous knowledge. However, the course also offers sufficient up to date research and new critical perspectives to be of interest to people with expertise in or academic familiarity with the topic as well. The main aim of the course is to provide this wide-ranging introduction in a self-contained, but in-depth form, alongside the important practical skills necessary to understand and discuss energy and climate policy, and lay the groundwork for greater engagement in the future – either through academic study, in the public, private or not-for-profit sectors.

À partir de la leçon

Climate change and energy security: resolving a tri-lemma

This week provides an introduction to the various conceptualisations of energy security and considers the implications these can have on energy and climate change strategies.

Week 5 Introduction2:14

Energy Security 113:50

Energy Security 2 - Diversification and Cost5:47

Rencontrer les enseignants

Harald Heubaum
Dr
Centre for International Studies and Diplomacy (CISD)

You raise energy security and its various different aspects -- accessibility,

affordability, availability at all times for sustainability as well.

In the more novel sort of definitions of the concept,

how can energy security in its different facets be married up to climate change?

How can we achieve both energy security and climate security at the same time?

Well, I think if you look at them both,

if you look at them individually with that view of the importance of both,

you will see that within energy security,

it's not just a question of being able to get a supply

of oil from a particular country or over the world.

What about the security that comes from having

your own generation which means you're not reliant on another country?

What about again a smart energy system

which uses different sources and when something goes down or whether knock something out,

something else comes online to deal with that loss?

As I say, we need to look at it in different ways.

The impact of our energy use on the climate is clearly,

that that connection has clearly been made.

You cannot think about climate security without

looking at the impact the energy choices have.

What needs to happen is for those in charge of energy to

understand the long-term implications of the choices they're making?

Energy security is regarded as an indeed foreign policy,

centers a great deal upon conflicts

around hydrocarbon production in the Middle East and elsewhere.

And what we don't have enough of is a discussion which says -- well,

if we're in a low carbon economy then our dependency

and the geostrategic and military imperatives around the Middle East,

if they don't go away then they are hugely lessened.

And so I think to argue with publics that we can free ourselves from

Middle East entanglements and the necessity as it's put of securing oil in the region.

This can provide a powerful parallel and reinforcing argument towards

a low zero carbon economy in parallel with that on climate change.

So most specifically, what is the security,

dimensional security benefit of renewables?

Well, for large parts of the world,

I mean China relies upon imports from

the Middle East which occur across sea lanes controlled by the American Navy.

A big strategic risk for China.

Europe and Japan rely upon oil imports from the region.

The policies of Saudi Arabia cater other parts of the region -- Iraq,

Iran are entrenched in the hydrocarbon production from this region.

And if you're in a position where frankly the demand is hugely less,

you don't need Middle East oil and gas because you're in

a zero carbon economy run on fuel cells,

windmills, and solar panels.

Then this gives you a national security reason for not being engaged

with the need to protect oil and gas resources in the Middle East.

And this should be and should have been for 20 years

a powerful security driver towards renewables.

But sadly, most of the green movements haven't wanted to get involved in these issues.

And I think this has been a strategic mistake on their part.

Are they getting involved in it now?

Not nearly enough.

It's ironic that the United States which isn't actually dependent upon Middle East oil.

There is an argument amongst

conservatives to free the US of dependency on the Middle East,

but you don't hear that amongst conservatives in Europe and I

think it's a strange intellectual and political dissidents.

And I think it's a shame that Greens and supporters of renewables in

Western Europe and United Kingdom and other parts of the world

don't play the national security card in support of renewable energy.

It would help their cause immeasurably.

The concept of energy security was known as the energy trilemma,

has only fairly recently in the past decade or

so recognized the aspect of sustainability.

So, like you say security of supply and for the nation that is the strategic security,

very much the idea that you have to ensure

that you could access and it's generally import fossil fuels,

classic sort of as, you know, Churchill,

you know, decided that the British Navy was going to run on oil rather than coal.

Suddenly, Britain had to secure

fossil fuels and that changed the strategic objectives in terms of

foreign policy and that's been part of the whole sort of

energy security big game of the 20th century.

So now we're in the sort of 21st century and if we're

moving to a low carbon world -- it's

the delivering energy security using low carbon energy systems.

And that will be across a range of different technologies.

So, it will be different for every country and different localities within countries,

I mean obviously some countries,

the variations in energy access differ from the north to south differently,

you know, where they may have more access to solar,

they may have more access to hydro in one part and the other.

The security issues around

renewables is there are some similarities and I think the thing is not

to consider that you move away from the problems we had in

terms of energy security in

the fossil fuel era and suddenly move to a different type of energy security.

And I think there are similarities,

there are issues about access to resources.

Even if you're investing in renewable energies,

you have to have access to the resources to deliver those renewable energies.

So, be that the primary resources to build

the technologies or actually the capacity to maintain them.

Firstly, climate change is a threat to security,

however you conceptualize it,

whether it's nation, state, or human.

And in using a security framework,

you push climate change up the agenda.

You get more attention for it,

you get more resources,

it becomes more of a priority.

So thinking about this insecurity times,

even before we think about what the security risks are,

is a choice of framing that brings benefits.

But there's also problems inheriting that.

Securitizing climate change starts bringing into question,

is it an external threat,

is it something that's been attacked within and it brings

about a framing that seems to have some clear solutions.

And again, those might not be the ones we want to draw upon.

We're seeing climate change just in terms of outside threats to states,

outside threat to life that can some commentators worry,

overshadow internal contributions to climate change.

So again, I think even before you think about the security aspects,

it's worth wondering why this framework has been adopted.

The climate change models that we're currently seeing

emphasize that it's about volatile shocks in the climate.

That's what's going to become more and more likely in

a warming world and that is key for availability.

What is central to energy security is that can have

enough energy and it can have it consistently and reliably.

I think it's the reliability that is really challenged by change climate.

Can you keep the amount of energy you need coming sustainably?

Again, this can refer to both trying to dig for coal and trying to drill for oil.

Right? I think that is hugely threatened in seas that are changing,

that are increasing, that are growing -- so the availability I think is key.

Although you can make the argument that exposure to

international energy commodity markets brings inherent energy insecurity,

volatile commodity prices, supply disruption,

it depends on your resource endowment to a certain extent.

But for the majority of the global economy who are

resource takers from the international markets -- becoming more autonomous,

developing where appropriate substitutes for

those internationally traded fossil fuels --

energy security is serviced by action on climate change,

and likewise there is a double dividend.

If you make the right policy choice,

if you pick the right technology,

that can lead to positive outcomes in either respect.

I would suggest that

quite discrete national discussion doesn't tend to work particularly well.

Energy security, if we were to consider

the intermittency of renewables as one example in the manner with

which European authorities have pursued more of

a federally integrated network approach to

offset peaks and troughs in the availability of certain types of energy,

that that's the basis of energy security in the future.

The very same way that pooled oil reserves and emergency stockpiles and the like,

such as we have seen released from within the IAEA at times of

crisis or member states supply disruption.

It kind of follows an established logic in a way which is

energy security is very rarely a discreetly national concern.

For the very same reason,

solutions to climate change are invariably international and not just

because the Paris Agreement binds the international community to a particular path,

but it's through those more collaborative ventures that the most efficient,

the lowest cost, the better opportunities tend to emerge.

And I mean that from the point of view of a bilateral governmental capacity building,

the multilateral frameworks that afford governments the

opportunity to create the right conditions for investment, but also,

the fact that companies will invariably be coming from abroad with finance,

with technical expertise to help address the carbon intensity of your economy.

To have a national champion,

a strong argument can be made that there are certain things that

the market is not fully pricing in and in a way,

a National Energy Authority,

you can look at the development of nuclear power in this country, for example,

the need to create a particular type of deal,

for lack of a better term,

for foreign investors has been politically quite contentious; whereas,

if we retained the local know how and how the National Atomic Energy championed,

the policymakers would be able to have much more direct engagement

with the firms required to drive the outcomes in their markets.

So, when does a sustainable energy source sustainable?

Who's deciding on who is being sustainable?

So the security, who decides on the criteria of security in that relationship?

There's another issue around climate change and security and energy,

is the impacts of climate change.

So, there are questions around investing in new forms of energy systems,

particularly say offshore wind for small island,

developing states, if you're going to see increasing numbers of typhoons, etc.,

and we have already seen as well for solar in some of

the small island states where there have been typhoons and hurricanes.

Investment in solar completely lost because

all the infrastructure in the housing was lost.

So, you know, the sustainability of the infrastructure,

etc., I mean these are again other questions.

Unlike you say this is research which is really

only starting to get done with questions thought about,

the interrelationship between the two,

because for a long time they haven't been thought about together.

And I think the idea of the energy trilemma is that you bring in the word

sustainable and suddenly it's we're just talking about green energy,

it's much more complex than that.

And there, you know,

isn't fluffy green clean renewables.

There are some insidious aspects of renewables, you know,

when you're talking about certain political economy of it,

and the policies that put that forward, you know.

There are interesting renewables

that not necessarily for the benefit of the poorest in the world.

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