The Expert Group on Clean Fossil Energy (EGCFE) was established by the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) Energy Working Group (EWG). The EGCFE leads the EWG’s work on clean fossil energy, supporting EWG’s overall efforts to promote economic growth, energy security and resilience, and environmental sustainability in the APEC region.
Specifically, the EGCFE’s mission is to encourage the use of clean fuels and energy technologies that will contribute to sound economic performance and achieve high environmental standards. The EGCFE has three main program elements:
The EGCFE promotes clean fossil energy options by facilitating, coordinating, and implementing a variety of activities, including projects, studies, workshops, and other meetings related to clean and efficient production and use of fossil fuels. EGCFE activities concurrently enhance economic development and mitigate the local, regional, and global environmental impacts (e.g., air emissions, water, and waste management) related to the entire fossil fuel production and use cycle throughout the region.
To learn more about how the EGCFE contributes to the EWG Strategic Plan and APEC leaders’ goals, read the report.
Thirteen of APEC’s twenty-one member economies are significant producers and/or consumers of coal, and most of the EGCFE’s activities are coal related. In fact, the EGCFE began as the Expert Group on Clean Coal Technologies (EGCCT) in the early 1990s. After the EGCFE expanded its work to include studies and workshops on unconventional gas, liquid natural gas, and elimination of fossil fuel subsidies, it was renamed in the late 1990s. Recently, the APEC Oil and Gas Security Initiative, which is managed by the Asia Pacific Energy Research Centre, moved under the EGCFE.
The United States, through the U.S. Department of Energy’s Office of Fossil Energy, has chaired the EGCFE since its establishment. The current EGCFE Chair is Scott Smouse, who has served as Chair since 2001, having been unanimously re-elected three times.
The EGCFE Secretariat is housed in the Japan Coal Energy Center (JCOAL).
For more details about the objectives, role, and mandates of EGCFE, please see the Terms of Reference.