EU-U.S. Energy Council to Address Security, Sustainability, Climate Change
November 5, 2009 // Published as a news service by IHS
The Energy Council aims to address such strategic energy issues as security of energy supply and policies to move towards low-carbon energy sources while strengthening scientific collaboration on energy technologies.
Some recent examples of energy cooperation between the EU and the U.S. are the new joint ENERGY STAR agreement on coordinating energy-efficient labeling programs for office equipment plus cooperation on the development of energy technologies, such as hydrogen energy and the International Thermonuclear Experimental Reactor (ITER) project for nuclear fusion.
The Energy Council will meet annually, alternately in the EU and U.S., and report to the EU-U.S. Summit. Operations will be structured through working groups of senior officials from both sides that will focus on three specific areas:
- Energy policies.
- Global energy security and global markets.
- Cooperation on energy technologies research.
The U.S. representatives on the Energy Council will be the secretary of state and the secretary of energy. Their counterparts on the European side will be the EU commissioners for energy, for external relations, and for science and research, as well as the EU presidency.
On June 21, 2006, the EU and the U.S. agreed to develop strategic cooperation on energy and energy security, as presented in a joint declaration at the EU-U.S. Vienna Presidential Summit. The establishment of the EU-U.S. Energy Council advances this initiative by providing more structured bilateral cooperation.
Source: European Commission (EC).