"All that is not to tell you it's impossible. It's to say there's no silver bullet, not one technology alone," Mandil told a UN meeting on energy efficiency here.

Current fossil-fuel dominated energy demand increases carbon dioxide (CO2) by one billion tonnes every two years, according to IEA data.

Energy demand will grow by more than 50 percent by 2030 if the pattern of consumption remains unchanged.

"This is not sustainable," Mandil reiterated.

Even very basic energy savings like phasing out wasteful incandescent light bulbs from 2008 and better street lighting could make significant inroads, the IEA chief argued.

The global cost of lighting could be reduced by 2.6 trillion dollars by 2030 and a cumulative 16 billion tonnes of carbon dioxide could be saved, according to the agency.

"The difference could reach one-third of lighting costs in 2030," Mandil said. "The additional investment costs would easily be offset by consumption savings."

However, none of the technological steps could be implemented on the kind of scale needed to tackle greenhouse gas emissions on their own, he cautioned.

About 78 percent of CO2 savings were likely to come from more efficient use of energy and 22 percent from cleaner energy sources by 2030, according to the agency.

Mandil said that to avoid one billion tonnes of greenhouse gases a year, the world would need to replace 300 convention coal-fired power plants with zero emission electricity generation every year, or build 150 one-gigawatt nuclear power plants.

That is also the equivalent of multiplying the United States's current solar power capacity by about 1,300 every year or 200 times the US wind farm capacity.

Carbon sequestration or storage -- which involves pumping carbon dioxide underground -- is still largely untested and very costly with current technology, the meeting for the UN Economic Commission for Europe's 60th anniversary heard.

Its is also contested in some scientific quarters, with experts fearing that storage chambers could be breached by earthquake or porous geology, spewing the CO2 into the atmosphere.

Mandil said 1,000 large carbon sequestration plants would have to be built annually to meet climate change targets.

The chairman of French oil group Total welcomed Europe's role in spearheading movement on climate change but underlined the need for a global response.

"That has to be welcomed, but that pioneering venture will only work if the United States and major emerging nations, which produce the most (greenhouse gas) emissions commit themselves to an equivalent effort," Thierry Demarest said.

The Total chief warned that unless that happened, the European effort could harm its industry's competitiveness in the longer term.

The UN's Kyoto protocol set targets for industrialised countries to trim outputs of carbon dioxide (CO2) and other gases that trap solar heat, unbalancing the planet's delicate climate system, by 2012.

However, the United States and Australia have stayed out of the binding agreement, while efforts to draw up a post-2012 deal drawing in developing countries are mired in problems.

earlier related report
Climate toolbox: The options for tackling global warming
Paris (AFP) April 28 - Here are the main options for reducing emissions of greenhouse gases, as sketched in a draft report by the UN's Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC).

The IPCC's "summary for policymakers" on how to mitigate climate change is to be issued in Bangkok next Friday after a five-day meeting.

The draft says an overarching goal is to establish a "price for carbon," a reference to carbon dioxide (CO2) and other greenhouse-gases emitted by burning fossil fuels and by farming.

If carbon pollution carries a significant price, producers and consumers are encouraged to switch to low-carbon products, technologies and processes -- and the higher the price, the faster the change and the deeper the cut in emissions.

To achieve a reasonable price, a basket of policies and technologies is needed and the mix can include regulatory, fiscal and voluntary measures, says the report.

The document does not make any recommendations, but highlights the following options as being proven as "environmentally effective":

TARGET FOSSIL FUELS
Reduce subsidies for fossil fuels and impose a carbon tax. Resistance by the fossil-fuel industry and by the public may make these measures politically hard to implement. Carbon storage (capturing CO2 from burning fossil fuels at power plants and other big sites and then storing the gas in chambers underground) has "significant mitigation potential" over the next two decades.

ENCOURAGE RENEWABLE ENERGIES
Help wind, solar, geothermal and other "clean" energies with subsidies, require the purchase of a given amount of the electricity they produce, or set tariffs that make them competitive against fossil-fuel rivals. A price of 20-100 dollars per tonne of CO2 would give renewables 30-35 percent of the total electricity market by 2030.

REDUCE ROAD POLLUTION
Fuel-economy and CO2 standards for cars, trucks and buses can be toughened. Countries can also invest in public transport and non-motorised forms of transport to wean people off the road. Higher taxes on car purchase, fuel and parking likewise discourage vehicle ownership, but become less effective with people on higher incomes. If CO2 is priced at 25 dollars per tonne, biofuels would get a tenth of the market for petrol and diesel.

MAKE BUILDINGS ENERGY EFFICIENT
Homes and offices are indirectly one of the biggest sources of carbon dioxide (CO2) as they are heated, cooled and lit chiefly by fossil fuels. Countries can reduce the emissions by regularly updating building codes and energy-efficiency standards for lighting, boilers, air-conditioning and other appliances. Thirty percent of projected emissions from buildings could be avoided by 2020 at "negative cost," meaning there would be a net gain because of lower energy bills. Solar panels, smart metering and "intelligent controls" over building conditions also have big emissions-cutting potential.

CUT CO2 FROM INDUSTRY
Options include subsidies and tax credits, as well as tradable permits, such as the so-called "carbon market" already underway in Europe under the UN's Kyoto Protocol. Voluntary agreements between industry and government are "politically attractive" and raise awareness about carbon pollution but most of these deals have not achieved significant reductions.

AGRICULTURE, FORESTRY AND WASTE
Provide financial incentives to improve land management to avoid CO2 and methane being released from soil and to maintain and manage forests. Trees capture CO2 when they grow, although the carbon is released back into the atmosphere when they die and decay. Landfills offer big potential in recovering methane from rotting rubbish, but they may need financial incentives and regulatory support to get the technology established.

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