OECD has recently extended some of their work over the past year with a central role for ICTs in shifting to a no-carbon emission economy (post, copied below for your convenience).
Clean technologies and smart ICT applications are key to effectively fight climate change, protect biodiversity and manage our water resources. In the declaration on green growth, ministers from OECD countries and beyond underscore that “green” and “growth” can go hand-in-hand.
The declaration addresses a gap identified earlier this year in an OECD report and at the OECD Conference “ICTs, the environment and climate change": governments now acknowledge that smart ICTs are key to drive systemic change towards low-carbon economies. The declaration and conclusions provide directions for OECD work in this area and set the stage for climate-change negotiations ahead of COP15 later this year.
Ministers underlined that in order for countries to advance towards sustainable low-carbon economies, international co-operation will be crucial in areas such as the development and diffusion of clean technologies, renewable energy technologies, and application of green ICT for raising energy efficiency, and the development of an international market for environmental goods and services.
Special efforts need to be made at the international level for co-operation on developing clean technology, including by reinforcing green ICT activities, fostering market mechanisms, and augmenting, streamlining and accelerating financing and other support to developing countries in their fight against climate change and the loss of biodiversity, and support in their water management.
You can access the Declaration on Green Growth and other information on the OECD Ministerial Council meeting 2009 at www.oecd.org/mcm2009.
Further information:
For comment on OECD work on ICTs and the environment, you can contact Graham Vickery, Head of the Information Economy Group: Graham.Vickery@oecd.org. See also www.oecd.org/sti/ict/green-ict.
The role of ICTs in improving environmental performance and contributing to the economic recovery was separately discussed at the high-level OECD Conference “ICTs, the environment and climate change", 27-28 May, Helsingør, Denmark. The OECD Secretary-General, Angel Gurría, and Danish Minister for Science, Technology and Innovation, Helge Sander, opened the conference. The full webcast is available.