The world must undergo a “new global energy revolution” and faces the gargantuan bill of $45 trillion (£23 trillion) if it is to halve carbon dioxide emissions by the year 2050, the International Energy Agency has warned.

The coming revolution will require sweeping changes to the electricity and auto industries. More than 215 million square metres of solar panels must be “planted” across the globe and the roads must be populated by a billion electric or hybrid cars, according to the influential agency.

Releasing its report on Energy Technology Perspectives in Tokyo today, Nobuo Tanaka, the IEA’s executive director, said: “We will require immediate policy action and a technological transition on an unprecedented scale."

The report, which set an aggressive agenda for impending summit talks on energy, included the forecast that in order to meet the soaring demand for power from emerging Asian economies, at least 32 new nuclear power plants must be constructed around the world every year over the next four decades.

According to the IEA, cleaning up the way that electricity is generated around the world will cost governments more than a $1 trillion every year – a figure equivalent to the gross domestic product of Italy.

In the weighty report, published ahead of tomorrow’s meeting of Group of Eight energy ministers in the northern Japanese city of Aomori, the IEA stressed the need to invest in cutting-edge energy technologies, including the construction of 17,500 wind turbines and carbon-capture mechanisms for all coal-fired electricity plants.

The IEA’s projections included the cost of adding carbon-capture and storage systems to around 35 coal-powered and 25 gas-powered power plants every year from 2010. Fitting each plant with the new equipment is expected to cost around $1.5 billion per plant.

The energy ministers’ meeting was already expected to be feisty. Japan, the home of the original Kyoto protocol and host of the main G8 leaders’ meeting in July, has been keen to dedicate the entire series of summit meetings towards the issues of global warming and the energy crisis.

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