CEES Working Paper Series

Adil Najam and Cutler J. Cleveland
Center for Energy and Environmental Studies
Department of International Relations and Department of Geography
Boston University

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Introduction

This paper presents a framework for understanding energy issues in the context of sustainable development. It posits that there are three important ways in which energy is related to sustainable development: a) energy as a source of environmental stress, b) energy as a principal motor of macroeconomic growth, and c) energy as a prerequisite for meeting basic human needs. These three dimensions correspond to the three dimensions of the usual triangle of sustainable development: environmental, economic, and social. Using this framework, the paper traces how successive environmental summits at Stockholm (1972), Rio de Janeiro (1992) and Johannesburg (2002) have dealt with energy issues. It identifies a slow, surprising, and important evolution of how energy issues have been treated at these global discussions. Energy has received increasing prominence at these meetings and become more firmly rooted in the framework of sustainable development. Stockholm was primarily concerned with the environmental dimension, Rio de Janeiro focused on both the environmental and economic dimensions, and the major headway made at Johannesburg was the meaningful addition of the social dimension and the linking of energy issues to the United Nations’ Millennium Development Goals.

 

Keywords: Johannesburg Earth Summit, human development, Millennium Development Goals, sustainable development, energy, basic human needs

 

 

Acknowledgement: The authors, who are co-leaders of the Project on Human Development at the Fredrick Pardee Center for the Study of the Longer-Range Future at Boston University, thank the Pardee Center for a grant that made part of this research possible. They also thank Jenny K. Ahlen, Claire Norris and Janice M. Poling, all graduate students at Boston University, for their research assistance.

 

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