NEW YORK, April 28 2015 – Leaders from government, business and civil society will announce new commitments and drive action to end energy poverty and fight climate change during the second annual UN Sustainable Energy for all Forum.
Between May 18 and 21, they will present ways to catalyse finance and investment at the scale required to meet the targets of the UN Sustainable Energy for All (SE4All) initiative on energy access, energy efficiency and renewable energy.
More than 1,000 practitioners will share and advance innovative energy solutions. The Forum will build momentum on energy issues ahead of both the September UN Summit to adopt the post-2015 development agenda, and the December Climate Conference in Paris, and contribute to shaping the direction of energy policy for the crucial decades to come.
Launched by the UN Secretary-General in 2011, the Sustainable Energy for All initiative, a multi-stakeholder partnership, aims to achieve three inter-linked global targets: to ensure universal access to modern energy services, to double the global rate of improvement in energy efficiency and to double the share of renewable energy in the global energy mix, all by 2030.
At the UN, governments have already identified sustainable energy as one of the new generation of sustainable development goals that are expected to be adopted in September.
Currently one out of five people lives without access to electricity, and nearly 40 percent of the world’s population rely on wood, coal, charcoal or animal waste to cook and heat their homes, leading to over four million deaths each year, mostly women and children, from the effects of indoor smoke.
