Technology and Climate Change

Thank you, Chairman.

Without advanced technologies to transform the way we produce and use energy, the United States believes the world will be unable to achieve the Convention’s long-term objective for greenhouse gas emissions reductions. As a central element of President Bush’s climate change strategy, the United States is investing nearly $3 billion annually in a diversified portfolio of technology options that can provide abundant energy to power economic development and still meet our climate change objectives.

We place great emphasis on leveraging resources through partnerships with businesses, academia, and other countries. Therefore, the United States is pleased to be involved in the following multilateral technology partnerships that will dramatically impact our ability to address climate change in an economically sensible way.

• The U.S.-organized the Carbon Sequestration Leadership Forum provides its 17 members with a framework to foster the rapid development and deployment of cost-effective and environmentally safe carbon dioxide sequestration technologies.
  
• In the International Partnership for the Hydrogen Economy, another U.S. initiative, 16 governments are working together to overcome the technological, financial, and institutional barriers to hasten the global transition to a hydrogen economy.
  
• The Generation IV International Forum is a multilateral effort to develop the next generation of economical and safe nuclear reactors, and the ITER project, once established, will help us realize the promise of nuclear fusion.

Further, we are committed to the UK-initiated Renewable Energy and Energy Efficiency Partnership to expand the global markets for these systems and the Climate Technology Initiative to advance practical efforts to promote technology transfer to developing countries.

An important objective of U.S. participation in many of our collaborations, such as the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation forum, is to mobilize private sector investment by promoting innovative financing that reduces risks and transaction costs. These efforts are aimed at developing new policies and business models to create self-sustaining markets for financing energy efficiency, renewable, and infrastructure projects.

We also support the Expert Group on Technology Transfer’s efforts to build collaboration to accelerate technology transfer through a country-driven approach that recognizes the value of assessing technology needs to set priorities and creating the right conditions for investment.

This work furthers sustainable development by advancing broader economic and social goals. Nations that develop strong, market-based institutions will be in the best position to make the sustained investments necessary to manage climate change over the long term.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman, for the opportunity to share our perspective on this important topic.