中国气候变化信息网 China Climate Change Info-Net

In the battle against global warming, innovation in energy technology plays a vital part in putting a brake on greenhouse gas emissions, scientists and officials say.

Continuing the upward trend in recent years, the total greenhouse gas emissions of the 40 leading industrialized nations rose to 18.2 billion tons in 2005, close to the all-time high of 18.7 billion tons set in 1990, according to the secretariat of the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change.

As the ongoing UN Climate Change Conference in Indonesia gathers global momentum for tackling climate change, scientists and officials have already begun exploring new technologies to cut down on greenhouse gas emissions and mitigate the impact of growing emissions.

Geosequestration is the geological storage of carbon dioxide in deep rock formations and is an important option for cutting greenhouse gas emissions to the atmosphere.

A study by the Center for Global Development, a U.S. think-tank, has shown per capita emissions of carbon dioxide in Australia rank first globally with an annual 11 tons apiece. However, by virtue of carbon dioxide capture and storage technology, Australia is estimated to have the capacity to store 25-30 percent of its emissions underground.

The world's largest carbon burial experiment was launched in February in southern Australia. Researchers extract carbon dioxide from a nearby natural geological reservoir and compress it into a "supercritical fluid," a gas-liquid hybrid, which will be injected via a 2,100-meter well into a sandstone reservoir.

While carbon dioxide capture and storage holds the promise of keeping carbon dioxide safely underground, innovative technologies are expected in other areas like bio-energy, as well as wind, solar, hydrogen and nuclear power.

Unveiling its European Strategic Energy Technology Plan in November, the European Union (EU) said in a statement: "Research and innovation in energy technology are therefore vital in meeting the EU's ambition to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by 60-80 percent by 2050."

And the business community has shown growing interest in technological innovation on climate change. A recent study shows big companies are increasingly realizing that climate change means "both challenges and opportunities" for their business growth. Cars driven by hybrid power, for instance, have become popular in recent years.

However, challenges remain for innovation.

A Science magazine report in October said that with current technology, scientists are unable to predict very specifically the extent of global warming in the future. It is therefore imperative that research needs to be boosted.

Financially support for innovation has been on the ebb. In the EU, the budget for research and development on energy, in both the public and private sector, has been decreasing since the 1980s.

"The easy availability of resources, no carbon constraints and the commercial imperatives of market forces have not only left us dependent on fossil fuels, but have tempered the interest for innovation and investment in new energy technologies," the EU statement said.

Finally, technological barriers have hampered efforts to address climate change. New technologies are sometimes either not easily accessible or affordable for some countries, especially developing nations, because of commercial interests or a lack of funding.