Opening by Mr. Väyrynen at the UN Commission on Sustainable Development, Nordic Council of Ministers' side event
UN Commission on Sustainable Development 15th session, New York
Nordic Council of Ministers' side event
"Sustainable Growth – a Nordic Point of View"
9 May 2007 at 1:15 pm at UN Headquarters, West Terrace
Opening by Mr. Paavo Väyrynen, Minister for Foreign Trade and Development of Finland
Distinguished Colleagues, Ladies and Gentlemen,
It is a great pleasure for me to address this side event. As you might know, the new Government of Finland was appointed just a few weeks ago. It has set out a strategic program that tackles many challenges that are on the agenda of this 15th session of the UN Commission on Sustainable Development. Particularly long-term objectives and measures for climate and energy policies are at the very heart of the program of the new government.
What makes this side event special to me is that I can share this podium with my Nordic colleagues. The Nordic countries have common values, and similar historical background and social structures. Moreover, our joint insight that we face many common challenges has provided a solid foundation for close co-operation aiming at sustainable development of the region. On the other hand, the Nordic countries are also aware of their wider responsibility for enhancing sustainable development – in the neighboring areas as well as globally.
Ladies and Gentlemen,
Finland holds the Presidency of the Nordic Council of Ministers this year. Our Presidency is designed to improve the capacity of the Nordic region to meet global challenges and to make the best of new opportunities, and to build confidence in the so called Nordic model. As a member country of the European Union Finland intends to align Nordic cooperation more closely with EU policy guidelines.
The Nordic Region regularly comes out at top in international studies of competitiveness, sustainable development, education, welfare, living standards and equality. To my mind it is particularly noteworthy that year after year the Nordic countries have managed to perform well in terms of both economic growth and environmental sustainability. To me this indicates that we have done something right. This model is worth maintaining, developing and yes, even marketing.
Dear Ministers, Ladies and Gentlemen,
Finland puts particular emphasis on an integrated climate and energy policy. We realize that both globally and nationally we need to focus on reliable and affordable access to energy services to meet basic human needs and environmental targets. This means policies to lessen the dependency on fossil fuels. Therefore, we need to concentrate all our efforts on promoting renewable energies, energy efficiency and energy saving, not to forget about full use and transfer of existing and new technologies. Finland will strive to ensure that emissions reduction projects implemented with Finnish financing in developing countries reduce poverty and promote sustainable development. The objective is to link climate policy to all sustainable development policies and to global reduction of poverty.
In Finland, the share of renewable energy in total primary energy supply is about 25 percent. It means that we have on national level exceeded the EU target of a 20 percent share of renewable energies by 2020. From a sustainable development point of view, renewable energy has many virtues. Most importantly, its use does not increase CO2 emission but furthermore, its use enhances the goals of employment and regional policy and contributes to security of supply. Renewable energy has also become a major element of the Finnish export of technology.
Finland is the leading country in the world in the utilization of wood based biomass, mainly wood-based fuels and by-products of forest industries. Also the use of other renewable biomass energy like energy crops, biogas and recovered energy is growing. The share of biomass is about 20 percent of our primary energy supply and 10 percent of our electricity is produced by wood-based fuels. This is the result of long-term research and development work as well as other promotion measures carried out as a part of our energy and technology policy. We believe that this experience could be transferred to developing countries with similar resource base.
In fact, we have a very successful showcase in this field. Finland has initiated an Energy and Environment Partnership (EEP) with Central America which promotes the use of renewable energy sources in eight Central American countries. The Partnership organizes biannual thematic seminars and has initiated, or is part in 120 projects which involve stakeholders from grass-root level to policy makers. These projects include studies, surveys and demonstration projects in all fields of renewable energy. One example where EEP's role has been instrumental in the region is the cultivation of Jatropha Curcas oil plant and bio-diesel production. In this connection we would like to stress the importance of sustainable production of bio-fuels.
We believe that bio-energy production in general may be even more significant in terms of primary production and the entire national economy in the future. In the long term, renewable energy sources and improving energy efficiency will become increasingly important in global energy management. However, the impacts of its production need to be taken into consideration in bio-energy use. In Finnish conditions, the use of bio-fuels in solid form for heat production or in combined heat and power production has been developed efficiently throughout the whole production chain. Using biomass in Combined Heat and Power plants can provide energy efficiency of over 80 percent. In contrast, the production chain for liquid bio-fuels from cultivated plants requires significantly more energy. We believe in Finland that focusing on research and export in this sector will create a lot of market opportunities in the future.
Dear Participants,
I am convinced that we need to use innovative market-based instruments to pull the market towards sustainable energy production and use. For example, the rapidly expanding heat pump business sector in Northern Europe has originated from targeted procurement that transformed 'low-hanging fruits' into market-ready technologies. Perhaps surprisingly, this type of procurement is not based on investment subsidies, but simply on economies of scale and sound technology assessment.
In parallel with initiating a market for new products, we should also scale up investments in those climate-friendly solutions that are already cost efficient. Finland has successfully implemented energy auditing activities for more than 15 years, and they offer practical means for systematically identifying investment opportunities in clean energy and development. Energy audits can be applied in many sectors: in buildings, industry, energy production, transportation – and renewable energy sources can be a part of the audit work, or even the core of it. The cumulative economic savings achieved attributed to energy auditing in Finland so far amount to several hundred million euros.
Still today, there is a considerable action gap between the growing awareness of the benefits of energy efficiency and the amount of win-win market opportunities that are still largely untapped. In my view – and I believe that my Nordic colleagues share this view – the success stories of tomorrow will be countries that are able to build their economies for the most eco-efficient consumption of natural resources as possible. Countries will succeed to a greater extent if they are able to offer progressive energy and water conservation technology and know-how, energy production solutions based on renewable sources of energy and eco-efficient material solutions based on new innovations.
We are going to hear more about these solutions this afternoon as my Nordic colleagues will introduce their approaches and best practices to sustainable energy.
Thank you for your attention and, on behalf of the Finnish Presidency of the Nordic Council of Ministers, you are warmly welcome to this event.