12
1 Energy Security and Sustainability: An Overview
substantial increases in Asia and Africa. Since wood fuel will continue to be the main
source of fuel in poor developing countries, the excess demand will be necessarily
met from the trees standing on non-forest wood lands in order to buffer the impact
on natural forests and defer the process of extinction.
A ‘business as usual’ scenario of rapid economic growth and industrialization
may result in further environmental damage, and that most of the developing and
underdeveloped regions may become more degraded, less forested, more polluted,
and less ecologically diverse in the future (Srivastav 2019). Natural forests, in their
present state of composition, productivity and extent, are in no position to meet the
growing wood fuel demand and in the event of continuous extraction of wood for
fuel, these forests will lose their naturalness and integrity.
Human development report of United Nations Development Program (UNDP) for
the year 2016 (UNDP, HDR 2016) severely criticizes the pattern of global development that has taken place over the past three decades. The report mentions that while
progress on human development front has been impressive and rapid strides have
been made during the past three decades, but unfortunately the development has not
been universally distributed across nations, societies, and ethnic group. There exist
deep fissures in rural and urban areas, men and women, poor and rich. One of the
focal areas of human development report is the HDI or Human Development Index
which is based on three fundamental issues of human development, namely:
i. A long and healthy life which is measured by life expectancy at birth.
ii. Access to knowledge which is measured by average number of years of education
received in a lifetime by people aged 25 years and older and access to learning
and knowledge by expected years of schooling for children of school-entry age;
and
iii. A decent standard of living measured by Gross National Income (GNI) per capita
expressed in constant 2011 international dollars converted using purchasing
power parity (PPP) conversion rates.
A new concept (using both internal and external energy) was introduced by UNDP
during 2010 that was based on the deprivations suffered by households in education,
health, and living standard (Fig. 1.5). Ten indicators were used to measure these three
deprivations, and a cutoff at 33.3% was fixed in each case to distinguish between
poor and non-poor. Of the ten indicators, education and health had two indicators
each, whereas living standard had six indicators. In other words, if a household’s
deprivation score was 33.3% or higher, it was categorized as multidimensionally
poor. Households with a deprivation score between 20 and 33.3% were categorized
as living near multidimensional poverty. For the purpose of determining poverty, the
report used India’s data for the year 2005–2006 and concluded that 55.3% of India’s
population (642,391,000 people) was multidimensionally poor and another 18.2%
(212,018,000 people) lived near multidimensional poverty.
A closer examination of the above indicators reveals that if a country has to
improve its HDI ranking and index, it will necessarily have to ensure adequate
energy supply to its citizens. The term energy in the context encompasses energy for
internal growth of individual, that is derived from food, water, and air as well as for
1 Energy Security and Sustainability: An Overview
substantial increases in Asia and Africa. Since wood fuel will continue to be the main
source of fuel in poor developing countries, the excess demand will be necessarily
met from the trees standing on non-forest wood lands in order to buffer the impact
on natural forests and defer the process of extinction.
A ‘business as usual’ scenario of rapid economic growth and industrialization
may result in further environmental damage, and that most of the developing and
underdeveloped regions may become more degraded, less forested, more polluted,
and less ecologically diverse in the future (Srivastav 2019). Natural forests, in their
present state of composition, productivity and extent, are in no position to meet the
growing wood fuel demand and in the event of continuous extraction of wood for
fuel, these forests will lose their naturalness and integrity.
Human development report of United Nations Development Program (UNDP) for
the year 2016 (UNDP, HDR 2016) severely criticizes the pattern of global development that has taken place over the past three decades. The report mentions that while
progress on human development front has been impressive and rapid strides have
been made during the past three decades, but unfortunately the development has not
been universally distributed across nations, societies, and ethnic group. There exist
deep fissures in rural and urban areas, men and women, poor and rich. One of the
focal areas of human development report is the HDI or Human Development Index
which is based on three fundamental issues of human development, namely:
i. A long and healthy life which is measured by life expectancy at birth.
ii. Access to knowledge which is measured by average number of years of education
received in a lifetime by people aged 25 years and older and access to learning
and knowledge by expected years of schooling for children of school-entry age;
and
iii. A decent standard of living measured by Gross National Income (GNI) per capita
expressed in constant 2011 international dollars converted using purchasing
power parity (PPP) conversion rates.
A new concept (using both internal and external energy) was introduced by UNDP
during 2010 that was based on the deprivations suffered by households in education,
health, and living standard (Fig. 1.5). Ten indicators were used to measure these three
deprivations, and a cutoff at 33.3% was fixed in each case to distinguish between
poor and non-poor. Of the ten indicators, education and health had two indicators
each, whereas living standard had six indicators. In other words, if a household’s
deprivation score was 33.3% or higher, it was categorized as multidimensionally
poor. Households with a deprivation score between 20 and 33.3% were categorized
as living near multidimensional poverty. For the purpose of determining poverty, the
report used India’s data for the year 2005–2006 and concluded that 55.3% of India’s
population (642,391,000 people) was multidimensionally poor and another 18.2%
(212,018,000 people) lived near multidimensional poverty.
A closer examination of the above indicators reveals that if a country has to
improve its HDI ranking and index, it will necessarily have to ensure adequate
energy supply to its citizens. The term energy in the context encompasses energy for
internal growth of individual, that is derived from food, water, and air as well as for