World Council for Renewable Energy

#EnergyRevolutionNow

Last week the Heads of State and Governments of the 20 economically strongest industrialized and threshold countries met in Hamburg. The hosting German government has put the topics of Energy and Climate on the agenda.

But in 2017 it would have taken far more than good intentions and political speeches at a summer-meeting that is not constituted democratically and has no real legitimacy under international law. WCRE demanded that the participants take concrete steps towards the rapid conversion of the energy industry to 100 percent renewable energy by 2030. This expansion is urgently necessary. And it is also possible: this is demonstrated by the progress even in the face of political restrictions: The share of renewables in power generation grew by 70 percent in the G20 countries from 2011 to 2016; in the UK 300%. Germany was able to increase its share by 360 percent – a growth rate that the conservative government now wants to stop.

A solar car developed by two Gazan mechanical engineering students, Jamal Mikaty and Khaled Bardawil in response to the electricity crises.

The European Union and Germany must lead in calling for an end to the new and cruel restriction on electricity  in Gaza. On the face of it it results from a power struggle between the Palestinian Authority and Hamas - in reality this is the logical outcome of the long occupation and decade-long blockade, supported by the US and, in part, the EU.

Europe and the world now must embrace the immediate and radical exit from coal, petroleum, natural gas and uranium.

The new EPA director and sworn enemy of the environment Scott Pruitt even denies that he is a climate change denier. He is ideologically and politically opposed to the comprehensive shift to renewable energy - and has seized power in all matters climate change policy. Not only is he hell-bent on demolishing the most important achievements of the United States Environmental Protection Agency, he has reinforced Donald Trump in his decision that the best revenge for the 'European humiliation' - the meetings with NATO, Pope, Merkel, Macron and others - is the theatrical exit from the Paris Climate Accord. The Accord is weak - but now its weakness has become terrifyingly obvious: the Accord will not save us, and working with Trump only accelerates the cynical spiral into the climate abyss.

Europe and the world community now have also politically and existentially no other choice but the immediate and comprehensive entry into the Solar Age: to compensate for the temporary national policy lapse of the US, to build resilience, regional prosperity and resource autonomy, to save the costs for subsidising and importing petroleum, natural gas, coal and uranium, and provide important impulses in technological and industrial innovations and market positions.

Statement by EUROSOLAR President Professor Peter Droege on the Paris-exit by the United States
Bonn, 6 June 2017

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