With dwindling fossil fuel resources and climate changes looming, researchers argue that the world as we know is about to change. The fossil fuels that have predicated the matchless expansion of the 20th century show difficulties in keeping up with increasing demand. At the same time, continued use of remaining fossil fuel deposits risks pushing the world towards catastrophic climate changes.
On 9 june 2010 centre executive director Johan Rockström and researcher Karl Hallding teamed up with Professor Kjell Aleklett from Global Energy Systems Group, Uppsala University to discuss future energy and climate security challenges.
Four scenarios — four outcomes
Karl Hallding, Head of SEI´s China Cluster and an expert on scenarios, presented four possible global scenarios for climate change and peaking fossil reserves with a time horizon ranging from a decade to a century.
He presented the scenarios through a matrix of four possible directions and showed what the security outcomes will be for each route taken. Three of these futures will prove exceedingly challenging, he argues.
- Clearly, a combination of mounting climate change and increasing competition for peaking fossil deposits is creating new global, regional and local security challenges. These challenges are adding to traditional security issues in a changing landscape of economic and political power, he says.
