Introduction: climate policy is energy policy

Avoiding dangerous climate change is the defining challenge for humanity in the twenty-first century. Since the energy system is both the primary cause of climate change and the primary means of mitigation, the future evolution of energy policy is of critical importance. But energy policy is undergoing significant change for other reasons, including unstable and substantially higher oil and gas prices, conflict and instability in key producing regions such as the Middle East, fears of the economic consequences of declining world oil production and a rising perception of energy insecurity, especially within industrialised countries. While there are precedents for managing these developments, effective response to them all while at the same time redically reducing carbon emissions requires a major rethink of conventional assumptions and practices.