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Published by the Office of Energy and Environmental Industries
U.S. DEPARTMENT OF COMMERCE, International Trade Administration
March 2006
Issue no. 4
In July 2005, President Bush
announced The Asia-Pacific
Partnership on Clean Development
and Climate (APP). Its aim is to
promote the development and
deployment of cleaner and more
efficient energy technologies to
curtail the growth of greenhouse
gas (GHG) emissions worldwide. It
is viewed as a complement to the
United Nations Framework
Convention on Climate Change
(UNFCC) and its Kyoto Protocol.
The partnership includes the
United States and five Asian-Pacific
nations: Australia, China, India,
Japan, and South Korea.
Whereas the UNFCC seeks to coor-
dinate an international strategy to
combat climate change beginning
with quotas on carbon dioxide
emissions for developed world
countries, the APP focuses on
information-sharing about clean
energy development, as well as vol-
untary practical measures that can
be taken by the member countries
to improve energy efficiency while
continuing to promote growth and
development.
This focus will mean a concerted
effort to create new investment
opportunities, build local capacity,
and remove barriers to the intro-
duction of clean, more efficient
technologies. The six partners rec-
ognize that economic growth and
poverty reduction are essential to
enhancing environmental steward-
ship. The APP is intended to be a
progrowth initiative that involves
developed and developing coun-
tries in an effort to reduce the
GHG intensity of all partner
economies and to develop afford-
able energy conducive to continued
growth. The partnership also re-
spects each country’s energy policy.
At the recent inaugural APP minis-
terial meeting—held this past
January in Sydney, Australia—a
charter and a work plan were creat-
ed for this important initiative.
Eight industry task forces have
Inaugural Meeting of Asia-Pacific Partnership Sets Agenda
for Clean Energy Development
By Aaron Brickman
U.S. Secretary of