Asia Clean Energy Forum 2008

Opening Statment By
Ursula Schäfer-Preuss
Vice President, Knowledge Management and Sustainable Development

3 June 2008
ADB Headquarters, Mandaluyong City

Introduction

Mr. Angelo Reyes, Secretary of Energy of the Philippines; Mr. Enrique Penalosa, former Mayor of Bogota, Colombia; Mr. Paul Jones, Deputy Chief of Mission, US Embassy - Philippines; and distinguished guests: good morning. On behalf of the Asian Development Bank (ADB), I would like to welcome and thank all of you for coming here to share your knowledge, experience and commitment to promote clean energy and address climate change.

I am delighted that our Forum has grown over the last two years in so many ways. We started in 2006 with just about 125 participants. Today, we have well over 500 participants from over 40 countries. I would like to thank the United States Agency for International Development (USAID), the Asia Pacific Partnership for Clean Development and Climate (APP), the Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) for supporting us for the second consecutive year. I also welcome our new partners, the Governments of Australia, Japan, Norway, and Spain who are providing support through ADB's Clean Energy Financing Partnership Facility, and the Government of Germany who is providing support through the Cities Development Initiative for Asia (CDIA).

I think it is appropriate that the Forum is being held this week. As you know, 5th of June is the World Environment Day. ADB joins the global community in celebrating this special day which has been established to raise awareness and promote action on issues affecting the environment. In fact, we have made this the "environment week" at ADB, with a series of events and activities, including this Forum.

ADB has been supporting our developing member countries towards clean and sustainable development for the last three decades. Our efforts are reinvigorated through the recently approved Strategy-2020, ADB's long-term strategic framework, with its three main pillars of inclusive economic growth, regional integration, and environmentally sustainable growth. Today, I would like to talk about our accomplishments, the challenges, and the need for partnerships helping us to meet ADB's vision on clean energy and climate change.

Climate Change as a Development Issue

Climate change, and the need for clean energy, is a critical economic and social concern for us because of its adverse impacts on people's health, safety and livelihoods, with the poor disproportionately affected. These are at the heart of our efforts to meet the Millennium Development Goals.

For ADB, it also presents an opportunity to assist our developing countries into a more sustainable growth pathway. Based on the Strategy-2020, our efforts to promote clean energy will be guided by our new Energy Strategy, which will be finalized shortly. Let me highlight its three main objectives:

• Promoting energy efficiency and renewable energy: We launched our Energy Efficiency Initiative about three years ago, and set targets of increasing our investments in clean energy to $1 billion per year starting 2008. I am pleased that as of yesterday, we crossed our $1 billion threshold. The Municipal District Heating and Combined Heat and Power Development Project for the People's Republic of China (PRC) was approved by our Executive Board of Directors to support the installation and operation of energy efficient heating systems across the PRC.
• Maximizing access to energy for all: Yesterday, a workshop on scaling up energy access was held here at the headquarters. As an outcome of this workshop, we propose to collaborate with other organizations working on this important issue to develop a regional partnership and promote greater access to energy for the poor.
• Promoting energy sector reform, capacity building, and governance: Through our operations, we will continue to support the governments to engage in the necessary policy and regulatory reforms. These include establishing transparent tariff rates, developing an appropriate regulatory structure, and formulating long-term policy roadmaps. We will ensure that they are properly linked with human resource and capacity development.

What is also very important for all of us here in ADB Headquarters in Manila is the need to manage our corporate facilities to minimize impact on the environment. Our premises have received several energy efficiency awards and are ISO-14001 compliant. On the World Environment Day, we will release the results of a study on our institutional carbon foot print and our plans to decrease and off-set them.

Pillars for Achieving Our Goals

Although much has been achieved, we also realize that many formidable challenges are ahead of us. To meet our goals as described above, ADB will engage in the following:

• First, ADB seeks to work with a broad range of development partners. ADB is collaborating with the World Bank and others to establish the Climate Investment Facility (CIF). ADB will continue to support multilateral efforts such as those under the UNFCCC Conference of the Parties (COP), the G8 Summit and ministerial meetings, as well as the ASEAN Summit.
• Second, we also recognize that private sector investments will constitute the largest share of investment and financial flows required to address climate change. ADB will help expand public-private-partnerships to address climate change. The carbon market is already playing an important role in generating climate responsive investment flows to the region.
• Finally, ADB will also continue to provide knowledge and advisory support to developing countries to help them tackle various issues associated with climate change. For example, we are currently undertaking a study of the economics of climate change in Southeast Asia, in coordination with the UK Government.

Conclusions

The challenges we face today, soaring fuel and commodity prices, threats from climate change, and growing problems of poor people having limited or no access to energy, all point to the need to take action. These issues are interlinked and will require our collective and coordinated response. This Forum, we hope, will be instrumental in catalyzing necessary actions. I encourage everyone of us here to continue and strengthen our collaboration towards a more prosperous, cleaner, safer, and healthier world for future generations. I look forward to fruitful exchange of knowledge in the next three days.

Thank you.