Introduction

Energy is essential for human development and energy systems are a crucial entry point for addressing the most pressing global challenges of the 21st century, including sustainable economic and social development, poverty eradication, adequate food production and food security, health for all, climate protection, conservation of ecosystems, peace and security. Yet, more than a decade into the 21st century, current energy systems do not meet these challenges.

A major transformation is therefore required to address these challenges and to avoid potentially catastrophic future consequences for human and planetary systems. The Global Energy Assessment (GEA) demonstrates that energy system change is the key for addressing and resolving these challenges. The GEA identifies strategies that could help resolve the multiple challenges simultaneously and bring multiple benefits. Their successful implementation requires determined, sustained and immediate action.

Transformative change in the energy system may not be internally generated; due to institutional inertia, incumbency and lack of capacity and agility of existing organizations to respond effectively to changing conditions. In such situations clear and consistent external policy signals may be required to initiate and sustain the transformative change needed to meet the sustainability challenges of the 21st century.

The industrial revolution catapulted humanity onto an explosive development path, whereby, reliance on muscle power and traditional biomass was replaced mostly by fossil fuels. In 2005, some 78% of global energy was based on fossil energy sources that provided abundant and ever cheaper energy services to more than half the people in the world.

Executive Summary

Despite providing significant benefits for human health, energy systems also negatively affect global health in major ways today, causing directly perhaps as many as five million premature deaths annually and more than 5% of all illhealth (measured as lost healthy life years). Air pollution from incomplete combustion of fossil fuels and biomass fuels is by far the single major reason that energy systems negatively affect global health, although ash, sulfur, mercury, and other contaminants in fossil fuels also play a role. Effects on workers in energy industries are the second biggest health impact globally.

The largest exposures to energy-related air pollution occur in and around households, particularly in developing countries where unprocessed biomass (wood and agricultural wastes) and coal are used for cooking and heating in simple appliances.

This chapter does not focus on differences in impacts among alternative energy systems that have minor impacts on global health; rather, the focus is on the most significant impacts of energy systems on health. The important positive impacts of energy systems on health are mostly addressed in Chapter 2.

Given the importance of avoiding climate change, there is secondary focus on the ways that mitigating climate change through changes in energy systems might achieve important health improvements: co-benefits.

Unless major policy interventions are introduced, energy systems are expected to continue contributing significantly to the global burden of disease for years to come.

Introduction and Roadmap

Life is but a continuous process of energy conversion and transformation. The accomplishments of civilization have largely been achieved through the increasingly efficient and extensive harnessing of various forms of energy to extend human capabilities and ingenuity. Energy is similarly indispensable for continued human development and economic growth. Providing adequate, affordable energy is a necessary (even if by itself insufficient) prerequisite for eradicating poverty, improving human welfare, and raising living standards worldwide. Without economic growth, it will also be difficult to address social and environmental challenges, especially those associated with poverty. Without continued institutional, social, and technological innovation, it will be impossible to address planetary challenges such as climate change. Energy extraction, conversion, and use always generate undesirable by-products and emissions – at a minimum in the form of dissipated heat. Energy cannot be created or destroyed – it can only be converted from one form to another, along a one-way street from higher to lower grades (qualities) of energy. Although it is common to discuss energy “consumption,” energy is actually transformed rather than consumed.

This Energy Primer 1 aims at a basic-level introduction to fundamental concepts and data that help to understand energy systems holistically and to provide a common conceptual and terminological framework before examining in greater detail the various aspects of energy systems from challenges and options to integrated solutions, as done in the different chapters of the Global Energy Assessment (GEA).

Introduction

Energy is essential for human development and energy systems are a crucial entry point for addressing the most pressing global challenges of the 21st century, including sustainable economic, and social development, poverty eradication, adequate food production and food security, health for all, climate protection, conservation of ecosystems, peace, and security. Yet, more than a decade into the 21st century, current energy systems do not meet these challenges.

In this context, two considerations are important. The first is the capacity and agility of the players within the energy system to seize opportunities in response to these challenges. The second is the response capacity of the energy system itself, as the investments are long-term and tend to follow standard financial patterns, mainly avoiding risks and price instabilities. This traditional approach does not embrace the transformation needed to respond properly to the economic, environmental, and social sustainability challenges of the 21st century.

A major transformation is required to address these challenges and to avoid potentially catastrophic consequences for human and planetary systems. The GEA identifies strategies that could help resolve the multiple challenges simultaneously and bring multiple benefits. Their successful implementation requires determined, sustained, and immediate action.

The industrial revolution catapulted humanity onto an explosive development path, whereby reliance on muscle power and traditional biomass was replaced mostly by fossil fuels. In 2005, approximately 78% of global energy was based on fossil energy sources that provided abundant and ever cheaper energy services to more than half the world's population.

Introduction

In order to better understand the potential impact of global environmental change on human health it is necessary to accomplish two contrasting tasks. First, it is important to widen the conceptual structure by which health risks are evaluated to include a broader array of more distal risk factors than has been common in public health in recent years. In addition, to focus the analysis in terms that facilitate meaningful comparisons with other important risks to health, there is need to structure the analysis in absolute measures of ill-health and in terms of standard and emerging decision-making tools. Progress in both these arenas will be needed to effectively guide intervention policies.

To approach these tasks, we follow a temporal progression. First, we briefly examine historical views of human health and the environment to show that the challenges now created by global environmental change actually extend contemporary public health's scope into realms previously embraced by the field. We next offer an analytical structure for addressing the linkages and pathways between multiple social and ecological processes acting at various scales, ultimately influencing health. Issues of causality and capability lead us to examine how a disease-based, resource-effectiveness paradigm might be expanded to understand environment–health connections today. We quantify the current contribution of environmental risk factors to ill-health, and from this basis peer into the future. We discuss how attributable and avoidable risk calculations relate to public health planning, and the implications of incorporating considerations of net present value and sustainability.