WWF predicts clean energy future

GENEVA, Switzerland, Feb. 7 (UPI) -- World energy demands will be met completely by clean, renewable energy by 2050, the World Wide Fund For Nature said in a report.

"If we continue to rely on fossil fuels, we face a future of increasing anxieties over energy costs, energy security and climate change impacts," WWF Director General Jim Leape said in a statement.

He said a report by the WWF and environmental consultant company Ecofys said that within the next 40 years, conventional and nuclear fuel would make up only a tiny fraction of energy supplies.

The report said the efficient use of energy in buildings, vehicles and industry would be a "key ingredient" in bringing the energy predictions to reality along with the increased use of alternative and renewable energy.

Ecofys said total energy demand in 2050 would be 15 percent lower than 2005 levels because of improved efficiency. The level of harmful emissions, meanwhile, would drop dramatically, which the group said would bring global climate change under control.

Both groups note that in order for the 2050 energy predictions to come true, the world needs to put as much effort behind energy reform as it did the global financial crisis.

"At Ecofys we know that solutions for the global energy challenge are at hand," Ecofys Director Kees van der Leun said in his statement.