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Pathways to 2020 Able to Deliver the Additional 6 to 11 Gigatonne Cuts Needed to Get World onto Safe Track

The Vienna Energy Forum 2011 was held from 21-23 June 2011 at the Hofburg Palace in Vienna, Austria. The Forum addressed the theme, “Energy for All – Time for Action.”3CSEP Director, Diana Urge-Vorsatz participated in the round table discussion, 'Role of Energy Efficiency in Productive Uses.' She gave the presentation, The risks of and opportunities for a significant acceleration of energy efficiency.

The European Council for an Energy Efficient Economy organized the 10th annual eceee summer study. This is a unique bi-annual event that gathers policymakers, researchers, activists and professionals around energy efficiency issues. In its 2011 edition, two papers authored by 3CSEP researchers - "Co-benefits quantified: employment, energy security and fuel poverty implications of the large-scale, deep retrofitting of the Hungarian building stock" and "How far can buildings take us in solving climate change?

The United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) will prepare a follow up publication to “The Emissions Gap Report.” Publication of the report preceded the climate change talks in Cancun, Mexico in 2010. The first report assessed the collective pledges of countries to keep global temperature below a 2 degree Celsius rise. In the new edition of the report, Professor Diana Urge-Vorsatz will be a co-author on the chapter focused on climate change mitigation options.

Fatih Birol, Chief Economist, International Energy Agency (IEA), delivered a public lecture on Critical Factors Changing the Future Global Energy Landscape at CEU on November 26, 2010.

Two recent European policy discussions on energy use featured input from Diana Urge-Vorsatz, Professor in CEU's Department of Environmental Sciences and Policy -- more specifically, with her research on the so-called "lock-in effect". This research is indicating that policy-makers and developers are potentially missing out on substantial long-term efficiency improvements, by focusing solely on low-hanging fruit in their approach to the environmental retro-fitting of buildings.