ABSTRACT
What about the countries that have only just started their industrialisation process? The figure suggests that the less developed countries (LDCs) are still on a rising energy intensity curve. The key issue in this context is whether they will be able to learn from the experience of other countries and make the necessary transition. As we have seen most countries so far have been able to improve on their predecessors’ performance. It would be tragic if the LDCs could not follow and instead replicated the worst excesses of the first countries to industrialise. It would obviously be preferable if they could ‘leapfrog’ the conventional industrialisation process, that is, miss out on some of the intermediate stages, and opt straight away for the ‘cleaner’, more efficient technologies.
