South Korean academic Rae Kwon Chung, a member of the International Panel on Climate Change that jointly won the 2007 Nobel Peace Prize, told the 12th Gaidar Forum in Moscow that Russia was well positioned to take on the role of producing and exporting hydrogen.
“As Russia is an oil and gas exporting country, I think it is a major challenge how Russia can transform itself from fossil fuel energy exporter to new energy sources around the world,” Rae Kwon Chung told the gathering by video link.
“For example, hydrogen will be a new form of new energy that can be supplied from Russia to countries around the world. Hydrogen is something in which Russia can be most competitive in producing within Russia and exporting, Just like the gas Russia has exported so far.”
From a technical standpoint, he said, this new task would not be an easy one.
“This is a very important challenge to Russia – a technical and a financial challenge. Russia alone cannot solve the problem,” he told the gathering. “I think it has to be some kind of global arrangement. Like Korea or the European Union or some other countries can have an agreement to import hydrogen from Russia as a new form of energy. This is a new important challenge for all of us around the world.”
Rae Kwon Chung said that moves to create carbon-neutral economies could provide a new stimulus for the world, motivating countries to create new sectors of development.
But there could be no doubt that the planet was facing a climate crisis.
“Everybody is already feeling it,” he said. “Our own countries are already suffering from the climate crisis, including Russia, including Korea and all other countries around the world.”
He noted that U.S President-elect Joe Biden had committed his administration to a carbon-neutral economy by 2050 and supported similar moves undertaken by the European Union and other countries.
“At the moment, governments are more and more willing to take on such obligations,” he said. “We are observing a reversal of the previous trend which essentially took the form of denying (the problem).”
The Gaidar Forum is an annual conference for scientific and related matters in terms of the economy which has been held since 2010. Its organisers include the Russian Academy for the National Economy and Public Administration, the Gaidar Institute of Economic Policy and the Association of Innovative Regions of Russia. The TASS news agency is the forum’s principal information partner.
Source: tass.ru