Fact Sheet
Department of State and Department of Energy
April 25, 2007

Additional Information Asia-Pacific Partnership on clean Development and Climate websites: http://www.state.gov/app http/www.asiapacificpartrnership.org

Purpose of Initiative:
The Asia-Pacific Partnership on Clean Development and Climate (APP) is an innovative effort designed to accelerate the development and deployment of clean energy technologies. The Partners have agreed to work together and with the private sector on energy security, national air pollution reduction, and climate change in ways that promote sustainable economic growth and poverty reduction. President Bush directed the Secretaries of State and Energy to carry forward the Partnership for the United States.

Partners:
Governments : Australia, China, India, Japan, Republic of Korea, and the United States of America.

Private Sector: The governments of Partner countries will work together with their respective private sectors to expand markets for investment and trade in cleaner, more efficient energy technologies, goods, and services in key sectors.

Partnership Goals:
The Partnership will focus on expanding trade and investment in cleaner energy technologies, goods and services in key market sectors through eight public-private sector Task Forces. The eight Task Forces address generally:

• Supporting Research, Development and Demonstration of Clean Energy technologies;
  
• Identifying market enabling activities such as addressing policy barriers to the diffusion of Clean Energy technologies; and
  
• Facilitating investment in, installation and deployment of Clean Energy technology

Each task force has its own specific goals:

(1) Cleaner fossil energy: Accelerate demonstration, deployment and transfer of key technologies to improve environmental and economic performance of fossil fuel use.

(2) Renewable energy and distributed generation: Facilitate the demonstration and deployment of renewable energy and distributed generation technologies in Partnership countries.

(3) Power generation and transmission: Assess opportunities for practical actions to develop and deploy power generation, transmission and demand side management technologies that can aid development and climate concerns.

(4) Steel: Develop processes to reduce energy usage, air pollution and greenhouse gas emissions from steel production

(5) Aluminum: Enhance current aluminum production processes through uptake of best - practice use of existing equipment Increase recycling across the Partnership.

(6) Cement: Facilitate demonstration and deployment of energy-efficient and cleaner product formulation technologies in Partnership countries that will significantly improve the greenhouse gas emissions intensity and the air pollutant emissions intensity of cement operations.

(7) Coal mining: Facilitate technologies and practices that can improve the economics and efficiencies of mining and processing and continue to improve safety and reduce environmental impacts.

(8) Buildings and appliances: Use cooperative mechanisms to support the further uptake of increasingly more energy efficient appliances and best building practices.

Progress toward Goals:

The Partnership is building on existing bilateral partnerships and multilateral climate change-related energy technology initiatives including the Carbon Sequestration Leadership Forum, the International Partnership for the Hydrogen Economy, and the Methane-to-Markets Partnership.

Towards its goal of facilitating investment in clean technology, the partnership sponsored a clean energy trade mission to India and China leading to deployment of new and more efficient energy technologies. In 2006, an Indian Reverse Trade Mission facilitated $12 million of investment in Renewable Energy technology. In its effort to identify policy barriers to the diffusion of clean energy technology, the partnership is assessing policy framework of energy technologies in India and China in order to facilitate new investment in distributed generation and renewable energy.

Task Force Progress:

1. Cleaner Fossil Energy Task Force: The U.S. is leading an assessment of natural gas methane capture opportunities in India. Partners are sharing information and demonstrating advanced coal technologies, including advanced combustion and coal gasification, and liquefaction.
2. Renewable Energy and Distributed Generation: Working in partnership with industry to address barriers to diffusion of Renewable Energy Technology and Distributed Generation including combined heat and power (CHP) applications.
3. Power Generation and Transmission Hosted two major site visits and peer to peer reviews this year to address efficiency, emissions controls, and clean coal technology, led by Japan and the U.S., with high participation from India and China.
4. Steel : Cooperating with China and India on new technologies and processes that will make steel production in these countries cleaner and more energy efficient "State of the Art" Technologies Handbook being prepared for release in 2007.
5. Aluminum: Held a workshop in China on how to reduce highly potent greenhouse gases (perfluorocarbons) -- potential to eliminate the equivalent of 15 to 20 million tons of CO2 per year in China alone; equivalent to the emissions from 20 medium sized coal power plants.
6. Cement Task: Analyzing the legal frameworks to identify barriers to implementing energy efficient and clean manufacturing technology; and developing benchmarks that allow for standardized measurement of the energy and environmental performance of participant countries' cement sectors.
7. Coal Mining Task Sharing best practices with India on coal beneficiation. This process can reduce significant quantities of ash from the coal resulting in increased thermal efficiency and potentially a 10-15% reduction in emissions of carbon dioxide.
8. Buildings and Appliances: Trained b uilding managers in India on low-cost/no-cost measures that improve building efficiency by 10-15%; the U.S. Energy Star and China CSC programs are harmonizing their energy efficiency labeling programs for appliances such as computers, televisions and copiers.

The Partnership's inaugural Ministerial meeting and the first meeting of its Policy and Implementation Committee (PIC), which the U.S. Chairs, took place in January 2006 in Sydney, Australia. This meeting resulted in the issuance of a Charter, Communiqué and Work Plan, available on the Partnership's website http://www.asiapacificpartnership.org/ Partner countries then met in Berkeley, California from April 19 - 21, 2006, and agreed upon Task Force Guidelines and Action Plan Guidelines, also available on the Partnership's website. The Partnership's Task Forces met throughout 2006, and the Policy and Implementation Committee met in Jeju, Korea, October 11-13. The eight Task Force Action Plans, which almost 100 collaborative projects, were approved on 31 October 2006. Since then, the Task Forces have continued their efforts to implement the initial set of projects and to explore additional cooperative opportunities.

Resources:
The United States Government has committed $52 million in funding to support the work of the Partnership as part of the President's Fiscal Year 2007 Budget. The U.S. will work to leverage contributions from the private sector, multilateral development banks, and international financial institutions. Australia has committed $100 M Australian Dollars to the Partnership over the next two years.

Next Steps: The Partnership is planning another meeting of the Policy and Implementation Committee in July, 2007 and a ministerial-level meeting in the fall. Task Force meetings are ongoing in all Partner countries.

USG Primary Points of Contact:

Barbara DeRosa-Joynt, Director
Administrative Support Group
Asia-Pacific Partnership on Clean Development and Climate
(Phone: 202/647-1863; E-Mail: app_asg@state.gov)

Mr. Griffin Thompson
U.S. Department of State
Office of Global Change
(Phone: 202/647-1139, E-Mail: ThompsonGM@state.gov)

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