Calling for Inter-generational participation in Green Economy

Calling for Inter-generational participation in Green Economy By Sailesh Singhal and Ravi Karkara

To achieve the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), the world needs to leverage the full potential of all generations. Solidarity across generations is key for sustainable development. We must collaborate to foster successful and equitable intergenerational relations and partnerships to ensure “no one is left behind.” While intergenerational solidarity and concern for future generations is being called for in tackling global issues. There is renewed call across the world for intergenerational solidarity, including in Our Common Agenda – many challenges remain 1 . 

Ageism continues to present a significant – yet, not sufficiently discussed – challenge to fostering collaboration and solidarity across age groups. The World Health Organization defines ageism as “the stereotypes (how we think), prejudice (how we feel) and discrimination (how we act) directed towards others or oneself, based on age”. Ageism is an insidious and often an unaddressed issue in health, human rights and development, and has bearings on both older and younger populations around the world. In addition, ageism regularly intersects with other forms of bias (such as racism and sexism) and impacts people in ways that prevent them to reach their full potential and comprehensively contribute to their community. Green Hydrogen will create Green Jobs While the hydrogen economy is a big business and is growing rapidly. As an industrial gas, hydrogen is already a huge global industry with strong fundamentals and favorable prospects. The global hydrogen market is forecast to increase $33 billion over the next 4 years, from US$122 billion in 2018 to US$155 billion in 2022. This is a growth rate of 33% over this period − a compound annual growth rate of over 6%/yr. The world market is expected to grow rapidly due to government regulations for desulfurization of petroleum products and increasing demand for hydrogen as a clean transportation fuel 2 .
Hydrogen is currently required in the refining industry as a petrochemical for hydrocracking and desulfurization. During petroleum refining, hydrogen is used for desulfurization, and thus the requirement for hydrogen in refineries depends on the sulfur level present in petroleum products.

Governments are regulating sulfur content in final petroleum products, and the demand for hydrogen in refineries is increasing rapidly. Hydrogen is used in large quantities for chemical product synthesis, especially to form ammonia and methanol, and is used as an agricultural fertilizer. It is also used for applications in metal production and fabrication, methanol production, food processing, cosmetics, electronics, FCs, engines and turbines, and energy storage. About 55% of the global hydrogen demand is for
ammonia synthesis, 25% in refineries, and 10% for methanol production. The other applications worldwide account for about 10% of hydrogen production 3 .
1
https://www.un.org/development/desa/youth/iyd2022.html#:~:text=To%20achieve%20the%20Sustainable%20De
velopment,is%20key%20for%20sustainable%20development
2 https://www.rees-journal.org/articles/rees/full_html/2019/01/rees180005s/rees180005s.html#R6

Amid a historic reimagining of the future of work, we’re faced with an urgent need to transition our society to a green economy to address the threat of climate change. We need to zoom in on the skills that power these jobs — green skills — and form an action plan 4 . “We expect to see millions of new jobs created globally in the next decade driven by new climate policies and commitments,” says LinkedIn chief executive Ryan Roslansky 5 For example, the number of jobs in renewables and the environment in the United States has increased by 237% over the last five years. In contrast, oil and gas jobs have only grown by 19%. Workers at all levels of education are growing their green skills. But, globally, the rate is faster among those with a bachelor’s degree or higher. The share of green talent in this category grew at an average of 11% a year
between 2015 and 2021, compared to 9% for other workers.

Celebrating Intergenerational Leadership in Green Hydrogen

On International Youth Day August 12, 500+ young people from 30+ countries joined in Celebrating Intergenerational Leadership in Green Hydrogen World for all ages.

Highlights from each Speaker:

Rodrigo A. Carazo: Youth For Green Hydrogen is a must & is walking the talk. The world needs clean energy and youth must be at the driving seat of that. We eagerly look forward to strengthening Youth For Green Hydrogen in Costa Rica.

RamachandruTejavath: Youth is the present & future of the world. We should progress sustainably. Bringing green hydrogen to young people is a progressive vision. I sincerely urge Youth For Green Hydrogen to deliberate and formulate recommendations on the formation of GH2 alliances at various levels.

YasaraRamanayake: Energy affects basic livelihood, including education. There is a very urgent need to work towards transiting towards cleaner energy that can be accessible for all. Representing half the world’s population, You and I have a greater responsibility to Ideate, Innovative & Implement. Universities can thus a play greater role in advancing Youth For Green Hydrogen

Shantanu Thakur: India being the youngest population has seen the commitment of Hon. Prime Minister in investing & building skills of young people in response to the 4th Industrial revolution contributing to the green and blue economy.

I am impressed by Youth For Green Hydrogen led by Sailesh & Ravi has brought around 70 countries to build momentum on Green Hydrogen. I invite young entrepreneurs, academicians, policymakers & activists working on Youth For Green Hydrogen as we celebrate 75 years of India’s Independence in this Azadi Ka Amrit Mahotsav.

Nienke Homan: As a regional minister of the Netherlands, at one point of time, we hit a crisis of consumption the natural gas. So, we made a stakeholders’ group including young people, industrialists, governments & academicians. We made an ambitious plan and an investment agenda to solve the crisis with solve and medium enterprises.

Alicia Carrasco: Skilling in Green Hydrogen is a different component that is required by different individuals and organizations in the energy transition. We need to skill at all levels, including the ones looking for jobs. Green hydrogen will make us less dependent on gas from Russia and make every country independent, thus making our economies stronger and here we need young people to innovate and revise the traditional energy system.

StanleyAnigbou: As young people, we should come together in providing a solution to the problems that is affecting everyone at large. I identified one problem in my neighborhood and thus founded LightEd which is on a mission to light up Africa by providing renewable solar-powered lighting solutions made from recycling electronic waste and local materials.

Kashika Kapoor: This young friend of ours, Sailesh, whom we all know here, started Youth For Green Hydrogen as an individual and within 4 months, has mobilized young people from 65 countries and signed 7 historic MOUs in advancing young people to provide climate solutions. At this stage, we need to continue building momentum and pressure groups and governments to come together in innovating, financing, and building climate solutions by making us a part of the process.

And yes, we can not repeat the same mistake again. We got to keep young women and girls part of the process in skilling and providing opportunities for them to be equal leaders in driving climate solutions at all levels.

Jonas Moberg: It’s not about creating a movement or just campaigning for the current situation it’s also the importance of the young who are responsible in the future to demonstrate that you see solutions and that is exactly where the power of such a network of Youth For Green Hydrogen that is being built lies.

And I hope over time what is being done on GH2 can be in a sense run in parallel with similar solutions-oriented networks amongst the world’s youth. Let’s build a network that support young people by sharing information, future skills, future jobs and by drawing their attention to interesting entrepreneurship opportunities that lies ahead of the world.

Highlights of MoUs:

Claire Behar: I’m thrilled to join Green Hydrogen champions from across the globe in announcing the partnership with Youth For Green Hydrogen. Though this partnership, we are going to be standing up in establishing the first North American chapters supporting youth education, mentorship and youth participation from very early age. Green hydrogen generation is the generation of the youth.

Dr. Arun Joshi: We look forward to providing all our technical expertise in creating Green Hydrogen curriculum and state policy. The new elected Panchayats in Madhya Pradesh will have huge opportunity for capacity building. Thus, together we can create a mass awareness about the need of Green Hydrogen along with Youth For Green Hydrogen to advance the energy transition. We will expand it pan eastern region of India.

Frans S. Kalenga: The leadership of Hon. Minister of Mines & Energy, we have established the Youth For Green Hydrogen Namibia Chapter which would focus on mobilising young people in Namibia & strengthen youth leadership in South African region. With the support of the Government, we would hold preparatory meetings, dialogues & discussions across the African region on Youth For Green Hydrogen. We commit to host South African Regional Youth4GH2 meet in Namibia.

K M AlMuneem Siddiqui: Fossil Fuel is going to deplete soon and to continue our consumption of energy, the only way out is Green Hydrogen. I am happy to lead Youth For Green Hydrogen in Bangladesh, where no youth is currently aware of.