This is the way to eliminate fuel poverty

Thousands of lives could be saved by giving energy bill rebates to the fuel poor that are conditional on having smart meters, advice, energy audits and eco-refits.

A recent report by Professor John Hills of the London School of Economics for the Government estimated that at least 2,700 people die every winter because they can’t afford their soaring heating bills.

This is more than the number who die on the roads each year.

Save the Children UK estimates that low-income families may pay up to £250 a year more for energy.

This is often because they do not pay by direct debit and are on pre-payment meters (although not all PPM customers are fuel poor).

But successive governments have found it hard to deal with the problem, and increased fuel prices have only served to make it worse.

Government policies to create a low carbon future are also adding around 8% to average energy bills, although in the future this means the bills won't be so vulnerable to fossil fuel price rises.

The only real solution to the problem is to help low-income householders use less energy and to improve the energy performance of their housing.

There has been no shortage of support for this idea already. Schemes include:

• The Energy Efficiency Commitment (EEC, 2002–2008), the Carbon Emissions Reduction Target (CERT, 2008–2012) and the Energy Company Obligation (ECO) due next year to replace it. Half of CERT's budget (£1.8 billion) was targeted at households in receipt of means-tested benefits or disability-related benefits or where the householder is aged 70 or over
• Publicly funded schemes like Warm Front in England, and related programmes in the devolved administrations, which cost £470 million in 2009/2010
• The Decent Homes refurbishment scheme for social housing in England (and similar schemes in the devolved administrations). According to the DCLG (Department for Communities and Local Government) £4 billion was spent on heating and insulation improvements between 2000-2008, plus £2 billion between 2008/2009 and 2010/11)
• The pilot Community Energy Saving Programme (CESP), running until December 2012 and costing £350 million, which is targeted at deprived areas and the hardest to treat housing.

This is about £1.77bn a year. But they have yet to prove that they provide effective value for money.

In fact the UK is further from eliminating fuel poverty in vulnerable households than ever.

For example, the House of Commons Public Accounts Committee, when it examined the Warm Front in 2009, found it to be poorly targeted despite using means-tested benefits, since nearly 75% of households entitled to a grant are unlikely to be in fuel poverty, yet only 35% of all those households likely to be in fuel poverty are eligible for it, partly because it only applied to private housing.

The scheme did not prioritise those with the most energy-inefficient accommodation, especially in rural areas.

How to eliminate fuel poverty

The first problem is targeting the appropriate households.

The Government is hoping to use two new ‘data frameworks’ – the Home Energy Efficiency Database (HEED) run by the Energy Saving Trust, and the National Energy Efficiency Data (NEED) framework, which is being developed by DECC.

But there are severe problems with this: HEED does not include EPC ratings from England and Wales, and anyway EPC ratings will be available only for properties that have been put up for sale, missing out most people, especially pensioners, who do not move.

Therefore much greater attention needs to be paid to gathering and matching information.

It should not be beyond the bounds of the technically possible that much of this work can be done automatically, cross-checking with data from Local Authorities, energy utilities and charities.

After all, it's the sort of thing which the marketing departments of companies like Tesco do all the time.

But why not actually harness the power of crowd sourcing and encourage the fuel poor themselves to come forward by rewarding them to do so with a reduction and a rebate on their bills?

They should be able to volunteer through a central helpline run by the Energy Saving Trust and publicised by the energy companies themselves, as part of the Energy Company Obligation (ECO), as well through local authorities and charities.

A condition for the receipt of rebates should then be that households are given, through the ECO, an energy audit, and a complete whole house eco-refit based on this audit, followed by training on how to use any equipment that has been installed.

The refurbishment should be done on a whole-home basis to achieve the maximum benefit.

Immediately on coming forward, all these households should also be automatically given smart meters.

When these are installed, the occupants should be visited and show how to use them, and given personal advice on how to achieve even greater reductions in energy bills through broader energy-saving behaviours.

This would get them off pre-payment tariffs straight away, which would reduce their costs.

It would encourage them to set and aim at specific energy usage or bill totals within a week or a month, so that they gain greater awareness and control over their energy use and budgets.

This could reduce their bills by at least 10%.

But this won't reach every home. Far more fuel poor households are in the private rented sector than are owner-occupiers.

These homes are more likely to be in a poor state.

The 2011 Energy Act will force landlords to improve the energy efficiency performance of their stock from the year 2015, using measures for which there is funding available through the Green Deal or the ECO, if a review, to be held in 2014, reveals that they have not already made voluntary improvements using the Green Deal.

In theory this approach should eradicate the worst performance (F and G SAP-rated), but it doesn’t guarantee a minimum standard, and this needs to be set in absolute terms - say the number of kWh used per square meter per year.

The Warm Home Discount is a step towards such an approach using energy bill rebates.

However, it is currently confined to a single subset of target groups and is not linked at all to any characteristic of the dwelling.

It should therefore be reformed and made conditional on a combination of the above interventions.

This approach is argued for by Paul Ekins, of the UCL Energy Institute, University College London, and Matthew Lockwood, Institute of Public Policy Research (IPPR) and Institute of Development Studies, at the University of Sussex in a new report on Tackling fuel poverty during the transition to a low-carbon economy.

They propose that any energy bill rebates would be paid to eligible recipients, from the moment they are given their smart meters, while their energy efficiency upgrading is being done, and through the follow-up advisory stage.

The cost of this could partly be paid for, they say, through a reform of the Winter Fuel Payments, which is currently also not targeted well enough.

The cost of eliminating fuel poverty

The IPPR and National Energy Action recently tried to estimate the cost of doing this through energy efficiency measures and came up with around £20–30 billion for England, or up to £64 billion for the whole of the UK.

The combined annual average spend on Warm Front, the CERT priority group and CESP is just around £1 billion for 2008–2011.

At that rate it would take 20-30 years to get around to every household in England.

Doubling the annual spend to £2 billion would end fuel poverty in England within 10–15 years as well as creating jobs.

Quadrupling it would bring the end date even nearer.

Given the huge amounts being spent on bailing out the banking system this is a small consideration that would save thousands of lives and vastly improve the quality of life for millions of people in this country.

And it is about the same amount as that spent on the measures I list above anyway - so there wouldn't be much change, it would simply be better targeted. There would just be the cost of running the helpline and administering the process.

And this sum is not much more than the £1.77bn being spent per year already on the measures listed above.

So there would be just a slight step change financially; and the money would simply be better targeted, with an additional cost for running the helpline and administering the process.

If the cost of a £2bn spend were completely to be passed on to the consumer, it would add £80, or 6%, to an average annual energy bill of £1,200, and the fuel poor would automatically be protected from this by the rebate.

Surely this is worth it?

Success for 'Lighter Later' campaign

The Government is to consider supporting the Daylight Savings Bill, which could save hundreds of thousands of tonnes of carbon emissions a year.

If passed, the Bill could eventually mean the advancing of time by one hour throughout the year across the country for a trial period, but only if there is UK wide consensus.

Business Minister Edward Davey said: “This is an issue which affects everyone across the country so we cannot rush head first into this.

"We would need consensus from the devolved administrations if any change were to take place. We have therefore tabled amendments to the current Bill to make sure that it addresses these concerns."

The devolution arrangements for time zones mean that they are devolved in Northern Ireland but reserved in Scotland and Wales.

Therefore, for any daylight saving trial, consultation will be needed with the devolved executives in Scotland and Wales and the consent of the executive in Northern Ireland will also be required.

The amendments would be made at the forthcoming Committee stage in the House of Commons, expected in early November.

The Government says it would not introduce a trial if there was clear opposition in any part of the UK.

Davey added: “It is only right that we at least look at what the potential economic and social benefits of any change might be.

"Lower road deaths, reduced carbon dioxide emissions and improved health have all been argued over the years as possible benefits.

"If there is strong evidence to support this then we should at least see what the possible benefits are.”

The news was welcomed by Daniel Vockins of the Lighter Later campaign, who said "We're pretty excited! There's always been strong support for lighter evenings from across the political spectrum, but with the government officially backing the bill, it's much more likely to go through."

He said that the campaign currently has "40,000 people and 86 coalition members from the FA to The AA to SAGA, to our very latest member: the Scottish branch of the Royal Society for the Prevention of Accidents who joined up today".

The latter would be especially welcome to convince Scots, who have opposed it before on safety grounds, to back the bill.

The Bill has had a slow passage through Parliament. Rebecca Harris MP introduced it as a Private Members Bill on 30 June 2010 and passed Second Reading in the House of Commons on 3 December 2010.

It would "require the Secretary of State to conduct a cross-Departmental analysis of the potential costs and benefits of advancing time by one hour for all, or for part of the year" "and to require the Secretary of State to take certain action in the light of that analysis; and for connected purposes".

The Bill will need to be passed by both Houses by the end of the first session of Parliament, which ends in April 2012.

British Summer Time (BST) is harmonised across Europe under the 9th European Commission Directive on summer time harmonised, but time zones are the responsibility of individual Member States and vary across the EU.

BST begins and ends across member states as the last Sundays in March and October respectively - which this year means this next Sunday.

How would it work?

Since days are longer in the summer it is possible to shift the clocks so that daylight hours are more in line with waking hours, when society may find them most useful.

This already happens when clocks are put forward onto BST at the end of March, putting the UK on Greenwich Mean Time plus 1 hour.

Shifting to BST gives an extra hour of daylight in the evening so it can more easily be used for work or leisure, rather than in the mornings when many people are asleep.

A range of benefits to such a change are expected:

• fewer people killed and seriously injured on the roads (at least 80 fewer people killed each year)
• around 0.6% reduction in energy bills over winter
• cuts in crime
• reduced greenhouse gas emissions (around 500,000 tonnes CO2 per year)
• more daylight for recreation and sport activities (an average daily gain of 55 minutes of daylight in the evening)
• increased tourism revenue (over £2 billion per year)
• improved trade with Europe
• general improvements to health and wellbeing, particularly for the elderly.

But there are concerns in Scotland that the sun would not rise until 09:42 in midwinter in Edinburgh, although sunset would be delayed to 16:40 from 15:40 and this could increase accidents in the mornings.

A trial period is being suggested as a way to test out the full implications of a change.

No more PV subsidy for energy inefficient buildings - Barker

Greg Barker has told the domestic solar industry that all new domestic PV sites from April 2012 must meet minimum energy efficiency standards.

Speaking at the Solar Power UK conference yesterday in Birmingham to an audience of PV installers angry at the cut in Feed-in-Tariffs for PV that has thrown their business models onto the rubbish heap, he defended the cuts but then said that there will be "no more PV subsidy for energy inefficient buildings".

Barker admitted in his speech: "It cannot be right to encourage consumers to rush to install what are still expensive electricity generating systems in their homes before they have thoroughly explored all of the sensible options for reducing their energy consumption first".

This is an official acknowledgement that the Government's three key domestic energy policies have been implemented in the wrong order.
Since it is more economical to improve the energy efficiency of a property than to install generation capacity, the first policy should have been the Green Deal, followed by the Renewable Heat Incentive, then by the Feed-in-Tariffs for renewable electricity, a reversal of the actual order.
This is because renewable heat is more efficient and practical on the domestic scale in this country than renewable electricity.
Mr Barker drew back from announcing the widely expected cuts to the subsidies for PV electricity from 43p per kWh to around 20p per kWh, and refused to take questions from delegates, who fear that the cuts will kill their industry.

Instead, he told them that he expects the successful renewable energy companies of the future will be more like Energy Service Companies (ESCOs) in the sense that they will "diversify into new sectors and join the transformation of the energy efficiency market" with the same "gusto" as they have microgeneration.

ESCOs sell the service of energy supply, and so it is inherently in their interest to do so in the most efficient way in order to maximise profit and competitiveness.

Barker said that the forthcoming Comprehensive Review of the tariffs which DECC will soon hold, will seek ways to put FITs in the context of a "whole-house approach which prioritises energy efficiency and supports the right low-carbon heat and electricity technologies".

The consultation will also ask how business premises and non-domestic sites should be treated in the future.

Barker promised that the scheme will also be streamlined to make sure it works with the minimum of bureaucracy.

In an attempt at contrition, he did confess the need for "much greater coherence right across the green agenda" to synergise the Green Deal and energy efficiency measures, Feed in Tariffs for Microgeneration and the RHI.

He said he hopes to put an end to "stop start reviews". "We owe you that much," he told the sceptical PV industry representatives listening and thinking about their job security.

He said that the lower tariffs would mean "uptake" of the FITs "could continue to grow in a sustainable way" - sustainable to the Treasury budget, that is.

"The future of solar PV in the UK needs to be one based not on subsidy but on sound underlying economics," he explained.

Solar thermal

He therefore emphasised that he wants solar thermal water heating to have an important role.

In most parts of the country this can cut gas or electric water heating requirements by around 40% over the year, and so have a much bigger impact than solar electricity on bills and carbon reduction.

Barker said he is "keen to see a much greater integration of solar thermal and PV offerings in the marketplace – providing consumers with the best advice and the right technologies for their situation".

He also said that he will shortly be announcing support for 34 renewable heat projects from social housing providers, valued at over £4m, which represents "an increase of 33% on the original budget set aside for this competition".

Reclaiming the green agenda

Both Barker and Chris Huhne have been keen this week to try and undo the perception of damage to the Government's green image caused by George Osborne's recent pronouncements.

This subject was debated in the House of Commons yesterday, where MPs discussed a composite motion suggesting that most of the Government's avowedly green policies were failing.

These include the attempts to attract global investment in environmental technologies; the Waste Review, the planning regime changes, and the 27% cut in flood defence investment. It also called on the Government to "ensure mandatory carbon emissions reporting for all large UK companies to kick-start green jobs and growth".

Defra minister Richard Benyon hotly defended the Government's record against Labour and Green Party criticism.

Voting was split exactly on party lines with the 302 Tories and LibDems voting against and the remaining 222 voting for the motion.

New source of company advice

Outside of all this political jockeying, the Carbon Trust continues its steadfast work to make it as easy as possible for companies to save energy and money.

It latest wheeze, launched yesterday, is a new limited company, Carbon Trust Implementation, which will help UK companies reduce their energy costs and install greener, more efficient technology.

It is to provide independent, objective evaluation of the most effective energy efficiency and renewable energy technologies for a company; and help them choose "trusted, accredited suppliers" to carry out the work, as well as helping customers to run competitive tenders for their projects.

In order to make up for the cuts in public funding to the Trust, the service is funded by a flat rate commission from suppliers. This also means there is no cost to the company itself in obtaining this support.

Tom Delay, chief executive at the Carbon Trust said the new business "will help unlock £9 billion of investment into energy efficient equipment".

"We are confident that our new business will catalyse organisations to take action and in turn benefit from implementing cost effective energy efficiency and renewable energy projects and help the UK capitalise on green growth,” he said.

This is because it dovetails with the flexible Energy Efficiency Financing scheme that the Carbon Trust and Siemens Financial Services Ltd (SFS) launched in April 2011.

Huhne blasts critics of renewable energy as RHI gets go-ahead

Chris Huhne and Greg Barker on Monday reiterated the Government's commitment to renewable energy, highlighting especially how many jobs it is helping to create.

Energy Secretary Chris Huhne addressed the Renewable UK annual conference in Manchester, where WWF has launched a report which demonstrates how Britain could meet between 60 and 90% of its electricity demand from renewable sources by 2030.

And in London, Energy Minister Greg Barker announced that state aid approval has been granted by the European Commission for the Renewable Heat Incentive (RHI), enabling it to be launched for commercial purposes.

The E.C. had expressed concern that the large biomass tariff was set too high.

It has now been reduced from 2.7p per KWh to 1p per KWh.

Revised regulations have been re-laid in Parliament and it's hoped the scheme will be open to applications by the end of November 2011, subject to Parliamentary approval.

9,000 new jobs in one year

Chris Huhne, in his speech, countered critics of renewable energy (members of his audience will no doubt have their own ideas on whom he means) by saying that its technologies will deliver a third industrial revolution "every bit as profound as the first two".

“We are not going to save our economy by turning our back on renewable energy," he said.

“At a time when closures and cuts dominate the news cycle, next-generation industries are providing jobs and sinking capital into Britain."

He promised that the UK "will be the largest market in Europe for offshore wind” and highlighted the £1.7billion investment in renewable energy and over 9,000 jobs created just this year.

Wind developers need to get their act together

RenewableUK yesterday published figures at the conference showing that over the first half of this year onshore wind output was up 64% from 2.97TWh to 4.86TWh, whilst offshore rose even further, up 87% from 1.13TWh to 2.11TWh.

On 30th June 2011, 5,560MW of wind capacity was operational in the UK, with 3,615MW under construction.

A further 5,437MW was consented, awaiting construction, giving a grand total of 14,612MW consented, under construction or operational.

A further 9,084MW remain in the planning system awaiting determination.

This figure is slightly down from 9,174MW in the system at the end of 2010 and 9,299MW at the end of 2009.

But whereas consents for new wind capacity is rising, that for onshore wind has almost flatlined in the last four years due to problems at the planning stage.

Approvals for projects have reached an all-time low of 42%. English planning authorities are the most restrictive, approving only 26% of applications.

Developers have been their own worst enemies in many cases, the research shows, with holdups being caused by them not ensuring the project's commercial viability (17%), not selling projects (14%), objections due to interference with civil radar (14%), and grid connection problems (14%).

Problems with projects already operational and in construction include selling the projects after consent (26%), supply line issues with sourcing turbines (21%), intractable planning conditions (13%) and access route difficulties.

All of this points to developers needing to engage communities and do their homework better.

Offshore, the figures show that the UK may struggle to fulfil new orders in four years' time as the yearly growth in UK offshore wind farms is expected to double between 2015 and 2016.

Annual offshore wind deployment will rise to 1.2 gigawatts (GW) in 2012 and exceed 2.5 GW in 2016, after a forecast drop in activity in 2013-14 due to a lack of consented projects.

Bloomberg New Energy Finance’s analysis of offshore finance suggests that a further 3.67GW of offshore wind will be commissioned over 2012-15, requiring £13.6bn in investment.

WWF's six low carbon futures

The WWF report, prepared by GL Garrad Hassan (GL GH), portrays six potential future scenarios about the sourcing of the UK’s electricity in 2030.

They all achieve the near decarbonisation of the power sector without new nuclear power but differ according to the level of electricity demand and the use of different methods for ensuring system security.

In all cases, there would be ambitious increases in electric vehicles (EVs) and electric heating.

The more ambitious scenarios require more substantial energy efficiency and behavioural change to reduce demand.

WWF says that the core scenarios show that it is perfectly feasible to develop a stable and secure electricity system where renewables deliver at least 60% of the UK’s electricity demand by 2030.

This percentage is much higher than the 40% share suggested by the Government's Committee on Climate Change in its May 2011 Renewable Energy Review, which assumes the need for new nuclear power.

Gas, including the use of carbon capture and storage (CCS), and greater interconnection provide the rest of the UK’s electricity under these core scenarios.

Reducing demand further in the more ambitious scenarios would actually make the transition cheaper by cutting the capital costs of building new generation capacity by around £40bn by 2030.

The report was welcomed by Siemens, whose director for Business Development, Sustainability and Government Affairs, Michael Rolls, said it "highlights the need for strong stable policies to drive investment, stimulating the green economy and bringing skilled manufacturing, construction and service jobs to the UK.”

Gavin Neath, Unilever's senior vice president of Sustainability, also praised the report, saying that "reaching such a goal will not just be good for business but it will be absolutely essential if we are to retard the speed of accelerating climate change".

IEA chief says scrap fossil fuel subsidies or face catastrophe

As academics warn the world could exceed "safe" temperature levels in our lifetimes, the chief economist of the International Energy Agency (IEA) has urged the world to slash hundreds of billions of dollars of fossil fuel subsidies or face catastrophe.

Fatih Birol, speaking in an interview with EurActiv, says that the "$409 billion equivalent of fossil fuels subsidies in place around the world "encourage developing countries - where the bulk of the energy demand and CO2 emissions come from – [towards a] wasteful use of energy” and calls for their abolition.

He says that cutting these subsidies in major non-OECD countries is “the one single policy item” which could help decrease the rate of increase of global warming, so that it stays within "safe" limits.

These limits are estimated to be around 2 degrees Celsius above pre-industrial levels.

The likelihood of dangerous warming

Two papers, to be published in the latest edition of the journal Nature are warning that emissions could reach much higher temperatures during the lifetimes of many people alive today.

This could mean that "large parts of Eurasia, North Africa and Canada could potentially experience individual five-year average temperatures that exceed the 2 degree Celsius threshold by 2030 -- a timescale that is not so distant," one paper says.

Two degrees was the maximum limit set at the Copenhagen COP15 UNFCCC summit in 2009, and was reckoned to equate to a concentration of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere of 450 parts per million (ppm).

It is considered just about bearable, but with considerable costs.

Many consider this level itself to be dangerously risky and would prefer the limit to be 1.5 degrees Celsius, which equates to 350ppm.

The papers find that "most of the world's land surface is very likely to experience five-year average temperatures that exceed 2 degrees above pre-industrial levels by 2060" at the current rate of increase.

A 3.5 degree increase would cause “irreversible impacts”, such as the mass extinction of an estimated 40%-70% of the world’s species and rendering the equatorial belt largely uninhabitable, according to the Inter-governmental Panel on Climate Change.

The New Zealand scientists say that only if emissions are "substantially lowered", will the two degree threshold possibly be delayed by "up to several decades".

The second paper, by Zurich's Institute for Atmospheric and Climate Science, the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research and the Hadley Centre of the Meteorological Office, calculates that to achieve a greater than 66% chance of limiting temperature rise by this amount, global emissions will probably need to peak before 2020 and fall to about 44 gigatonnes of carbon dioxide equivalent by 2020.

Reducing fossil fuel subsidies

This puts Birol's call into perspective.

Speaking in advance of the release of the IEA's World Energy Outlook 2011 report on 9 November, he said that it will say that cutting fossil fuel subsidies would "help renewable energies such as solar and wind power to get a bigger market share".

The IEA's analysis finds that “the door for a 2 degrees trajectory may be closing if we do not act urgently and boldly,” Birol said.

The report examines seven scenarios. "“In our central scenario, seven countries introduce some form of carbon pricing which brings us to a 3.5 degree trajectory,” he explained.

“But if we want to keep the temperature increase to 2 degrees, many more countries need to do so. The most important condition is that there’s coordinated international action in place.”

The world in 2008-10 was subsidising fossil fuels by almost 13 times more than renewable energy sources such as wind and solar power and biofuels, according to Bloomberg New Energy Finance.

Fossil fuels received $557 billion compared to $43-46 billion for renewables.

Rather than going down, fossil fuel subsidies are increasing. The IEA expects them to reach $660 billion, or 0.7% of global GDP by 2020.

Reducing the subsidy would cut energy demand by 4.1% and CO2 emissions by 1.7 gigatonnes, with consequent increases in energy efficiency and more investment available for renewables.

Most of the subsidies are actually in the less developed countries, trying to compete with the developed ones.

Green Climate Fund

The United Nation's committee responsible for designing the £100bn fund which developing countries will use to help them tackle climate change before 2020, has produced its draft proposals, but not to unanimous agreement.

This fund was agreed at the COP15 and COP16 summits in Copenhagen (2009) and Cancun, Mexico (2010) and discussion of the draft will be a highlight of this year's summit in Durban, South Africa, beginning in six weeks.

However, the United States and Saudi Arabia have reduced their support for the overall design of the fund.

The draft was welcomed by Christiana Figueres, executive secretary of the U.N. Framework Convention on Climate Change.

"The Committee ended its work by submitting for consideration and approval in Durban both a draft instrument for the Green Climate Fund and recommendations on transitional arrangements to get it launched quickly," she said.

Developing countries are generally satisfied with most of the wording, especially that the fund should have its own legal status and independent secretariat, but disagreement remains over access to the funds, including the need to minimise the involvement of the Global Environment Facility and the World Bank.

Pa Ousman Jarju, chair of the Least Developed Countries negotiating block at the UN climate change talks says: “Enhanced direct access would allow more devolved decision-making to reflect local and national concerns and it would enable countries to integrate the funding into their national plans and strategies for dealing with climate change.”

For these reasons, Trevor Manuel the former finance minister of South Africa, who co-chaired the meeting on administering the fund with Kjetil Lund of Norway, called the outcome "sub-optimal".

Germany said that the committee’s failure to formally agree a design “will likely result in not having the Green Climate Fund this year or the next”.

Former chief of the UN climate change convention Yves de Boer has also criticised the fund.

He told the UN Environment Programme Finance Initiative event in Washington, DC last Wednesday, that the GCF “is going to be governed by a bunch of climate change negotiators, rather than by a lot of people that understand economics.

“The whole debate is around grant-based finance, instead of about how you catalyse significant funding, and basically the approach is to keep the private sector out - to the extent that you can - rather than to make this a consortia of public and private financing.”

The U.S. negotiators agree with him. They want developing countries as well as developed countries to contribute to the fund and for the private sector to be able to engage more. They also questioned the section on the fund having its own juridical personality.

But developing countries are suspicious. They believe the engagement of the private sector would open the potential for funds to be diverted away from developing countries towards developed countries’ companies and financial institutions, bypassing their governments.

If finally agreed, the fund will be used only for mitigation and adaptation initially, while many developing countries also want to use it for technology and capacity building, the very tactic which the IEA's Birol is calling for.

IEA chief says scrap fossil fuel subsidies or face catastrophe

As academics warn the world could exceed "safe" levels in our lifetimes, the chief economist of the International Energy Agency (IEA) has urged the world to slash hundreds of billions of dollars of fossil fuel subsidies or face catastrophe.

Fatih Birol, speaking in an interview with EurActiv, says that the "$409 billion equivalent of fossil fuels subsidies in place around the world "encourage developing countries - where the bulk of the energy demand and CO2 emissions come from – [towards a] wasteful use of energy” and calls for the abolition.

He says that cutting these subsidies in major non-OECD countries is “the one single policy item” which could help decrease the rate of increase of global warming, so that it stays within "safe" limits.

These limits are estimated to be around 2 degrees Celsius above pre-industrial levels.

The likelihood of dangerous warming

But two papers, to be published in the latest edition of the journal Nature are warning that emissions could reach much higher temperatures during the lifetimes of many people alive today.

This could mean that "large parts of Eurasia, North Africa and Canada could potentially experience individual five-year average temperatures that exceed the 2 degree Celsius threshold by 2030 -- a timescale that is not so distant," one paper says.

Two degrees was the maximum limit set at the Copenhagen COP15 UNFCCC summit in 2009, and was reckoned to equate to a concentration of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere of 450 parts per million (ppm).

It is considered just about bearable, but with considerable costs.

Many consider this level itself to be dangerously risky and would prefer the limit to be 1.5 degrees Celsius, which equates to 350ppm.

The papers find that "most of the world's land surface is very likely to experience five-year average temperatures that exceed 2 degrees above pre-industrial levels by 2060" at the current rate of increase.

A 3.5 degree increase would cause “irreversible impacts”, such as the mass extinction of an estimated 40%-70% of the world’s species and rendering the equatorial belt largely uninhabitable, according to the Inter-governmental Panel on Climate Change.

The New Zealand scientists say that only if emissions are "substantially lowered", will the two degree threshold possibly be delayed by "up to several decades".

The second paper, by Zurich's Institute for Atmospheric and Climate Science, the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research and the Hadley Centre of the Meteorological Office, calculates that to achieve a greater than 66% chance of limiting temperature rise by this amount, global emissions will probably need to peak before 2020 and fall to about 44 gigatonnes of carbon dioxide equivalent by 2020.

Reducing fossil fuel subsidies

This puts Birol's call into perspective.

Speaking in advance of the release of the IEA's World Energy Outlook 2011 report on 9 November, he said that it will say that cutting fossil fuel subsidies would "help renewable energies such as solar and wind power to get a bigger market share".

The IEA's analysis finds that “the door for a 2 degrees trajectory may be closing if we do not act urgently and boldly,” Birol said.

The report examines seven scenarios. "“In our central scenario, seven countries introduce some form of carbon pricing which brings us to a 3.5 degree trajectory,” he explained.

“But if we want to keep the temperature increase to 2 degrees, many more countries need to do so. The most important condition is that there’s coordinated international action in place.”

The world in 2008-10 was subsidising fossil fuels by almost 13 times more than renewable energy sources such as wind and solar power and biofuels, according to Bloomberg New Energy Finance.

Fossil fuels received $557 billion compared to $43-46 billion for renewables.

Rather than going down, fossil fuel subsidies are increasing. The IEA expects them to reach $660 billion, or 0.7% of global GDP by 2020.

Reducing the subsidy would cut energy demand by 4.1% and CO2 emissions by 1.7 gigatonnes, with consequent increases in energy efficiency and more investment available for renewables.

Most of the subsidies are actually in the less developed countries, trying to compete with the developed ones.

Green Climate Fund

The United Nation's committee responsible for designing the £100bn fund which developing countries will use to help them tackle climate change before 2020 has produced its draft proposals, but not to unanimous agreement.

This fund was agreed at the COP15 and COP16 summits in Copenhagen (2009) and Cancun, Mexico (2010) and the draft will be discussed at this year's summit in Durban, South Africa, beginning in six weeks.

However, the United States and Saudi Arabia have reduced their support for the overall design of the fund.

The committee tasked with the design work has met four times, and completed its work last week.

Examination of the draft will be a highlight of the Durban talks.

The draft was welcomed by Christiana Figueres, executive secretary of the U.N. Framework Convention on Climate Change.

"The Committee ended its work by submitting for consideration and approval in Durban both a draft instrument for the Green Climate Fund and recommendations on transitional arrangements to get it launched quickly," she said.

Developing countries are generally satisfied with most of the wording, especially that the fund should have its own legal status and independent secretariat, but disagreement remains over access to the funds, including the need to minimise the involvement of the Global Environment Facility and the World Bank.

Pa Ousman Jarju, chair of the Least Developed Countries negotiating block at the UN climate change talks says: “Enhanced direct access would allow more devolved decision-making to reflect local and national concerns and it would enable countries to integrate the funding into their national plans and strategies for dealing with climate change.”

For these reasons, Trevor Manuel the former finance minister of South Africa, who co-chaired the meeting on administering the fund with Kjetil Lund of Norway, called the outcome "sub-optimal".

Germany said that the committee’s failure to formally agree a design “will likely result in not having the Green Climate Fund this year or the next”.

Former chief of the UN climate change convention Yves de Boer has also criticised the fund.

He told the UN Environment Programme Finance Initiative event in Washington, DC last Wednesday, that the GCF “is going to be governed by a bunch of climate change negotiators, rather than by a lot of people that understand economics.

“The whole debate is around grant-based finance, instead of about how you catalyse significant funding, and basically the approach is to keep the private sector out - to the extent that you can - rather than to make this a consortia of public and private financing.”

The U.S. negotiators agree with him. They want developing countries as well as developed countries to contribute to the fund and for the private sector to be able to engage more. They also questioned the section on the fund having its own juridical personality.

But developing countries are suspicious. They believe the engagement of the private sector would open the potential for funds to be diverted away from developing countries towards developed countries’ companies and financial institutions, bypassing their governments.

If finally agreed, the fund will be used only for mitigation and adaptation initially, while many developing countries also want to use it for technology and capacity building, the very tactic which the IEA's Birol is calling for.

Climate change denialists and their fossil-fuel industry backers are finally nailed

The gloves are off. With the Durban climate change conference only six weeks away, a new film, trailed this week, shows how the fossil fuel industry has manipulated the climate change argument to slow governments' action on climate change to the point where we are now in a very tight corner.

But now that the truth is out, there is no excuse for firm, radical agreements not to be reached at the United Nations' 17th Conference of the Parties.

The documentary film pulls no punches. It is called Greedy Lying Bastards.

The trailer's release coincides not only with the the spread of the 'Occupy financial districts' actions around the world, from Spain and Wall Street to the City of London and elsewhere, which are making explicit links with climate change, but also to a new independent assessment of climate records that confirms the reality of global warming.

The Berkeley Earth Analysis of the records, which have been submitted for peer review, prove conclusively and without any room for remaining doubt that the earth has warmed just under 1.5 degrees Celsius since the beginning of the Industrial Revolution, and that the rate of temperature increase is accelerating rapidly.

There has been a rise of an average 0.9°C over land in the past half century.

The Economist magazine is among those convinced - the article linked to here critically examines the Berkeley researchers' methodology.

It concludes, scarily: "the world is warming fast".

This research not only vindicates the Climatic Research Unit (CRU) at the University of East Anglia, and indeed finds that warming over the last century may, if anything, be higher than they had claimed, but demolishes once and for all the lies of climate change denialists, who have been exposed as being financed by Big Oil.

Chief amongst these is one Anthony Watts who is funded by the oil-producing Koch Industries.

The Koch Brothers had actually funded the Berkeley research in an attempt to disprove CRU's climate scientists.

In a wonderful irony, the work ended up doing the opposite of what they intended.

The Kochs are backers of the American Tea Party and outspend ExxonMobil by three-to-one (a total of $24.9 million in 2005-2008) in financing climate change denialists.

“This film is an investigation into an industry that is simply out of control,” says Greedy Lying Bastards director Craig Rosebraugh.

“The fossil fuel industry has shown that it will stop at nothing to maximize profits for shareholders, whether it’s cutting corners on safety, employing highly paid lobbyists to impact the political process, giving huge amounts to climate change deniers to ensure that no legislation is passed that would impact the bottom line, or complicity in the murder of individuals who speak up against environmental degradation,” he says.

The staff at East Anglia's CRU continue to do good work.

Just this week, its researcher Dr Clare Goodess contributed a background paper on climate change and variability to a report published by the Government's Foresight team on the threat posed by massive population migrations that may be triggered by climate change.

This report, Migration and Global Environmental Change, examines how profound changes in environmental conditions such as flooding, drought and rising sea levels will influence and interact with patterns of global human migration over the next 50 years.

It is co-authored by Prof Neil Adger of the University of East Anglia’s (UEA) School of Environmental Sciences and the Tyndall Centre for Climate Change Research.

The report finds that "millions will be ‘trapped’ in vulnerable areas and unable to move, particularly in low-income countries.

"Migration is costly, and with environmental conditions such as drought and flooding eroding people’s livelihoods, migration – particularly over long distances – may be less possible in many situations. This creates high risk conditions."

More than 70 papers have been published and made available by the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills, which back up the research and validate the reality of climate change and its complex implications.

A special issue of the report’s background papers is also published in a peer-reviewed journal, Global Environmental Change, edited by Prof Adger and UEA colleagues Prof Kate Brown and Prof Declan Conway.

The UK's Coalition Government is, like everyone else, suffering from the world recession.

It is finding itself being forced to cut support for renewable and low carbon technology as a result.

But the science is unequivocal. We have to act.

And we have to do it together. This is why I repeat my message to David Cameron: that you must go to Durban this December.

We need political leadership.

Most business sectors, some of the fossil fuel and heavy energy using sectors aside, are calling for it. They see climate change as a business opportunity.

The 2 degrees C Challenge Communiqué, organised by The Prince of Wales’s EU Corporate Leaders’ Group on Climate Change, which consists of over 175 companies including Shell, Tesco, Kingfisher, Unilever and EDF Energy, this week called on governments to agree a “robust, equitable and effective agreement” in Durban.

It is to them that you must listen.

The world needs to reach decisive agreement on tackling climate change, before it is too late.

Huhne calls nuclear policy an expensive failure

Chris Huhne, the UK's Energy Secretary, yesterday called the UK nuclear policy "a runner to be the most expensive failure of post-war British policy-making"?

But it's even more expensive than he says!

Speaking to the Royal Society, Britain's most prestigious scientists, he was astonishingly frank.

"We manage the world’s largest plutonium stocks – more than a hundred tonnes – and they will need guarding for as long as it takes us to convert it and build long-term deep storage. And if we don’t, we will have to guard it for tens of thousands of years." he said.

High thought they seem, the figures he quotes are actually relatively low.

Those for managing the existing legacy are higher than the £59bn he mentions - referencing the Nuclear Decommissioning Authority.

The NDA's Nuclear Provision for 2010/2011 alone was just over £49 billion.

The last estimate for the cost of dealing with the waste and decommissioning of the U.K.'s 19 reactors, by the National Audit Office in January 2008, was £73 billion over 100 years, almost £12 billion (18 per cent) higher than the 2005 estimate.

But if one year's custody and decommissioning cost £49 billion, how much will it cost over the next century?

As Huhne said, though "I cannot be confident that the figure will not rise again as we discover yet more problems."

Meaning: it sure will.

The cost of dealing with this existing situation - mostly waste management - is huge - almost half of DECC's budget, and already, using the NAO's 2008 figure, about £1000 per UK individual.

Then Huhne quotes Arup's figures for the cost of energy: "Offshore wind is assessed at £130 per megawatt hour, gas with carbon capture at £95 per megawatt hour, and nuclear at £66 per megawatt hour".

I don't believe a gas plant with CCS will be built for at least 10 years. The technology is untested and too expensive.

SSE is having a wobble about the cost and asking for more cash from the Treasury now.

I'm not optimistic about its chances.

By 2020, offshore wind costs will have come down much further, just as nuclear costs are rising.

Offshore wind is a good bet. DECC has just launched a programme to bring costs down.

Tidal energy is fast rising. 31 projects are underway.

It is good that progress on keeping nuclear safe is being made. The safety record of UK nuclear reactors is excellent.

But this progress means that there are further delays and costs associated with new build. It's not surprising that companies like E.ON and SSE are pulling out.

My prediction is that no more than one new nuclear build will happen, and maybe not even that.

It will go over budget, over schedule, and do nothing to help us meet 2020 carbon reduction targets.

Too little, too late, too expensive, too risky, too compromising for future generations.

People call anti-nuclear campaigners irrational, but there is nothing irrational about that.

Weightman warns nuclear industry to do more research

Above: Dead cattle in barn on ranch at Namie, radiation exclusion zone, Fukushima Prefecture: photo by Tachyon (via Rocket News 24, 11 April 2011.

The post-Fukushima Weightman report into nuclear safety has been welcomed by the Government and industry as being favourable, but contains warnings to the industry.

Chris Huhne has interpreted the report on the UK's nuclear power stations and facilities as giving the green light to nuclear newbuild, but critics have claimed it is "rushed".

The report, by Dr. Mike Weightman, the chief nuclear inspector at the Office for Nuclear Regulation (ONR), "sees no reason to curtail the operation of power plants or other nuclear facilities in the UK" in the wake of the powerful earthquake and subsequent tsunami which crippled the Japanese plants in March, according to Energy Secretary Chris Huhne, who laid it before Parliament yesterday.

Huhne told the Commons that Weightman "believes the industry has reacted responsibly and appropriately, displaying strong leadership for safety and safety culture".

But the report makes a number of recommendations, including reviews of emergency procedures, of techniques for estimating radioactive source terms, and of the adequacy of the system of planning controls for commercial and residential developments off the nuclear licensed site, which will add to delays and costs for any developers.

It also charges the nuclear industry and the ONR to have "more open, transparent and trusted communications, and relationships, with the public".

Obfuscation was a widespread criticism of the industry in Japan and worldwide, both before and after the tsunami.

Although the Weightman report does say "there is no need to change the present siting strategies" for new nuclear power stations in the UK, it adds that the nuclear industry should "review the dependency of nuclear safety on off‐site infrastructure in extreme conditions" and look at flooding, power-supply and storage risks.

Caroline Flint, speaking for the first time in her new role replacing Meg Hillier as Labour's Shadow Energy Secretary, gave full support to the report, adding, "Now the Tory-led Government needs to give investors the support and confidence they need to deliver the construction of new capacity in the nuclear industry”.

Sellafield criticism

Sellafield is singled out for criticism by Dr. Weightman's report, saying that Sellafield Ltd, the company which runs the site, Britain’s Nuclear Decommissioning Authority which owns Sellafield, and the British Government “all regard urgent progress with the legacy ponds and silos remediation and retrievals programme as a national priority”.

“This priority is reinforced by the example of the Fukushima accident, where the vulnerabilities of an older plant were not sufficiently recognised and addressed,” says Dr. Weightman.

“The main focus for the site must remain the retrieval of the radioactive inventory from these facilities and the processing of the material into safer waste forms,” he reports. “In the meantime, contingency measures are put in place.”

The report says the storage ponds for nuclear waste at Sellafield, some of which are up to 50 years old, "can never be brought up to modern standards".

The heat-generating capacity of the radioactive material stored in the ponds is lower than that of fuel in an operating nuclear power plant, so accident scenarios generally develop over longer timescales than those modelled for nuclear power plants.

Sellafield’s management is reviewing the plant’s cooling, ventilation, inerting and containment systems and “the availability and reliability of these systems under accident conditions”, but the work has “yet to be completed”.

Flooding, venting and power supplies
The report also cautions about the danger of flooding.

It warns nuclear plant managers and developers (reiterating the point made in June in the Government's Response to Consultation on the Revised Draft National Policy Statements for Energy Infrastructure) that they must examine "the effects of the credible maximum scenario in the most recent projections of marine and coastal flooding", and "demonstrate that in principle adaptation to such a scenario would be possible".

The nuclear industry must "initiate a review of flooding studies, including from tsunamis, in light of the Japanese experience, to confirm the design basis and margins for flooding at UK nuclear sites".

It should also look at the ventilation and venting routes of radioactive gas and liquids for nuclear facilities.

The report admits that detailed information is not available on the performance of concrete, other structures and equipment, in earthquakes (Recommendation IR‐15).

Nor is there sufficient evidence about the "robustness and potential unavailability of off–site electrical supplies under severe hazard conditions" (Recommendation IR‐17).

Rushed report

Back in the Commons, it was left to Caroline Lucas of the Green Party to be one of the few MPs expressing scepticism, calling the report "rushed out", because of the lack of evidence backing the overall claim.

She complained that by being released in the form of a Written Statement it offered "little chance for Parliamentary scrutiny".

She added "It will do little to reassure the British public that the nuclear industry can be trusted to power our energy future".

Greenpeace provided evidence for this view by pointing out that its release is "significantly ahead of the major international comparable reviews into the implications of Fukushima", which are:

• 31 December: ONR's final report on EU stress tests.
• April 2012: Independent peer review of the national reports on the EU stress tests
• March 2012: UN action plan on nuclear safety
• August 2012: The Convention on Nuclear Safety meeting to consider the lessons of Fukushima.

Louise Hutchins, Greenpeace Senior Energy Campaigner said: "It's designed with one objective - to give the green light to a new generation of nuclear power stations, irrespective of the safety, environmental or rising financial costs of those nuclear stations. This is government complacency."

Labour's Paul Flynn, a long-time critic of nuclear power, agreed: "The country needs consideration of the full implications, principally the cost that is making nuclear power unaffordable and uninsurable throughout the planet.

"We are not getting that and we should ask the Government to do their full job and present us with a report that is comprehensive and full."

Under questioning, Mr. Huhne admitted that an email had been sent immediately after the Fukushima disaster from an official in the Business Department warning that it must not derail the UK's expansion of nuclear power and appealing to the industry to help the Government present the pro-nuclear case.

In answer to criticism that Dr Weightman could have looked at the costs of nuclear newbuild, Mr. Huhne said the Dr. Weightman "quite rightly, as the chief nuclear inspector charged with safety, takes the view that safety comes first regardless of the issues of costs".

Chris Huhne is progressing with plans to establish the ONR as a statutory body. Dr Weightman is to report within a year on the progress industry is making to improve standards, including plant layout, flood defences and other issues.

CBI urges Government to give investors certainty so business can fight climate change

Businesses want to and must maintain the trend to low carbon innovation, but need more investment, which requires commitment from politicians, both CBI Deputy Director-General Dr. Neil Bentley and Christiana Figueres, Executive Secretary of the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) told an audience of business leaders and the Energy Secretary Chris Huhne at the CBI’s first international Green Business Dinner in London last night.

Ms. Figueres also said that when countries like Britain fulfilled ambitious climate change targets this encouraged poorer countries like China and India to follow suit.

Companies are being given the wrong value by world stock markets, because the cost of their exposure to climate change is not being factored in, she said. "As long as these companies [that emit large quantities of greenhouse gases] have a high value, we are giving out the wrong signals," she said. "It has got to be that those companies that are investing in the technologies of the future are recognised."

She said that companies ought to take on board the political target of keeping global average temperatures below 2oC above pre-industrial levels. "We are moving to a low-carbon future – businesses need to understand that signal. This is a megatrend."

She said that by 2031 businesses will need to extract five times the economic value that they do today for every tonne of carbon dioxide emitted, calling on both governments and businesses to unleash the investment needed for "a transformation of the economy".

How committed are the Conservatives?

In the UK, the overwhelming feeling in the environmental industries sector is that George Osborne's speech to the Tory Party conference last week signalled an about-turn in Treasury thinking regarding support for low carbon technology.

Further evidence came from a Sunday Times article that Osborne is delaying rubber-stamping the Renewables Obligation Certificate banding review despite anger from David Cameron and other Ministers from DECC and Vince Cable's Business Department.

The consultation on an increase in speed limits, the proposal to reinstate weekly bin collections and, most importantly, Osborne's commitment to ensure the UK's carbon targets do not exceed those adopted by Europe were defended on Sunday's BBC Politics Show [22 minutes 20 seconds in] by Chris Huhne as marking either no change in the UK's position or not yet proven to have an impact on carbon emissions.

Osborne had hinted in his speech that part of his motivation for being cautious on the low carbon front was that there was opposition to green policies from members of the CBI.

Yet last night at the Green Business Dinner, the CBI’s Dr. Neil Bentley told the Government that British businesses are committed to tackling climate change, but blamed politicians at home and abroad for failing to provide clarity and certainty for investors about issues such as Electricity Market Reform, the Green Deal and a globally-binding emissions deal.

He said, "the case for a global emissions deal is even more compelling".

“Today, we find ourselves not ahead of the pack, but out on a limb," he said. "We’ve got no international deal, no global carbon price, no meaningful EU price and the UK tying itself in costly green policy knots.

"The UK is in danger of straining to hit its targets but missing the point: that we need an economy that’s low carbon and competitive.”

"We wanted first-mover advantage," he said, "We acted on the expectation of a global deal to address our competitiveness concerns. We acted without realising what was around the corner economically."

He blamed dithering and tinkering from Coalition politicians - such as making the Carbon Reduction Commitment into a straightforward tax, "adding to bottom-line costs and doing nothing to help businesses achieve their green goals" - as well as the low price of carbon due to an ineffectively managed EU Emissions Trading Scheme.

Europe's Environment Ministers, also meeting yesterday, are in agreement. They admitted that the number of "Assigned Amount Units (AAUs)" - free permits to pollute given to countries and industry - continues to be a problematic issue affecting the carbon price, but that suddenly reducing the number allocated would cause a mass sale and a price fall, which represents a double bind dilemma.

"We're going to have to continue to work on it," admitted Polish Environment Minister Andrzej Kraszewski after the meeting in Luxembourg.

Dr. Bentley also felt that that "the renewables target has skewed the economics of our energy market". The Treasury's carbon price floor is meant to address this but is not yet in force.

As a result, “investors are struggling to understand how to invest against the proposed framework while the resulting costs could damage parts of our manufacturing sector".

He also said there was "reluctance from financiers to take the risk of underwriting" the Green Deal, which could cause it to fail.

But yesterday, Energy and Climate Change Minister Greg Barker defended the Government's record.

In a statement responding on behalf of DECC to the Environmental Audit Committee's report on carbon budgets, which echoed the CBI leader's criticisms, he said the UK is "doing more than any other country in providing long term certainty to those investing in the low carbon economy".

He added the government was actually doing UK industry a favour by reviewing progress towards the EU emissions goal in 2014, to make sure it wasn't "disadvantaging British industry" and leading to "emissions being shipped overseas".

“Getting the rest of Europe to go further and faster in providing certainty to green investors is vital which is why we’re not letting up in pushing the EU to up its emissions reduction target to 30%,” Barker said.
 

The need for a deal at Durban

Dr. Bentley's speech underlined the necessity for a deal at the upcoming COP17 UNFCCC climate talks at Durban, since "last year saw the highest level of carbon emissions in history".

"Patience is wearing thin," he said, citing the failure at Copenhagen in 2009 and Cancun last year to reach global agreement. Wrangling "mustn’t drag on and on like the Doha Trade Round".
 
“In the absence of a deal," he continued, "companies have committed to get on with it because they understand that it’s not about what business can do for sustainability. It’s about what sustainability can do for business, driving innovation in new products and services."

He said the CBI is calling for two main outcomes from Durban: “Certainty that the Kyoto carbon markets will persist even if the protocol expires: if the Clean Development Mechanism is derailed, we’ll lose the most successful part of Kyoto and potential investment.
 
“And second, getting carbon finance flowing across the world, to places where it can encourage energy efficiency and help countries leapfrog high-carbon development and go straight for those green technologies. This will give the global economy the boost it needs."
 
He called for "a global, binding and comprehensive climate change deal. Otherwise business and nations will lose faith.”

EU ahead of targets

The EU will go to Durban well on its way to meeting its emissions targets from the Kyoto Treaty, which requires 20% cuts in Europe's emissions from 1990 levels by 2020.

Environment ministers in Luxembourg yesterday also committed to signing up to a 'Kyoto II' agreement at Durban, if other countries agreed.

Despite a 2.4 % emissions increase in 2010, and despite economic growth of 41% over the same period, Europe's greenhouse gas emissions were 15.5% below 1990 levels, according to estimates released yesterday by the European Environment Agency (EEA) on progress to meeting the continent's Kyoto targets.

In fact, the EU is likely to overshoot this target, which has inspired some member states, like the UK, to argue that it should be increased by to 30% cuts by 2020.

Climate Commissioner Connie Hedegaard said the figures showed that the EU has successfully decoupled emissions from economic growth through the wider use of low carbon technologies.

"The EU continued decoupling emissions from GDP during the recession," she said in a statement. "Between 2008 and 2009, emissions fell by 7.1 per cent in the EU-27, much more than the around four per cent contraction in GDP."

Of the 15 EU Member States with a common commitment under the Kyoto Protocol (the 'EU-15'), emissions were 10.7 % below base year levels (1990 in most cases), which is well beyond the collective 8 % reduction target. However, Austria, Italy and Luxembourg were still behind their targets.

"Many different policies have played an active role in bringing down greenhouse gas emissions", Professor Jacqueline McGlade, EEA Executive Director, said.

"Alongside renewable energy or energy efficiency, efforts to reduce water pollution from agriculture also led to emission reductions. This experience shows we can reduce emissions further if we consider the climate impacts of various policies more systematically."

Back at last night's Green Business Dinner, Christiana Figueres also was hoping that major progress will happen at Durban.

“Governments are willing to consider a document that is equivalent to a letter of intent of all Governments to move towards a comprehensive agreement that is binding to all and incentivising to all at some point in the future.”

She admitted that any agreement will take years to draw up but it would be a major leap forward if all countries agreed to the principal of a legally binding treaty.

She also hoped that Governments would agree on how to raise the $100 billion per year by 2020 they have committed to for adaptation to climate change, technology sharing and saving forests.

Energy efficiency and renewable energy to get EUR 75bn ERDF cash

Energy efficiency and renewable energy are set to be one of the 11 investment priorities under a new EUR 346 billion European Regional Development Fund (ERDF) budget for 2014-2020 being discussed in Brussels this week.

They constitute two areas that have been neglected during the current 2007-2013 budget period.

The European Commission's ERDF budget proposals, which were presented by the European Commission last Thursday foresee a total budget of EUR 376 billion (one percent of Europe Gross National income) for economic, social and territorial cohesion for the period 2014-2020.

The ERDF is a vital part of funding many infrastructure projects and aims to correct imbalances between regions. It supports R&D and innovation in climate change and environment, business support to SMEs, energy and transport infrastructures and sustainable urban development amongst other things.

Amongst the 11 investment priorities defined, one aims to support the shift towards a low-carbon economy in all sectors, including energy efficiency in public infrastructures and the housing sector.

From 2014, the so-called 'transition regions' of Europe (in the UK this includes Merseyside and South Yorkshire) and the more developed regions will be required to focus the largest part of their allocation (except for the European Social Fund) on energy efficiency and renewable energy, competitiveness of SMEs, and innovation, with 20% of resources to be focused on energy efficiency and renewables.

This equates to EUR 75.2bn for these territories, although in the less developed regions this percentage drops to 6% or EUR 22.56bn.

For the first time, urban policy is acknowledged and endowed with significant financial resources under the budget.

The budget is being debated by regional presidents and mayors (the 'Committee of the Regions') Tuesday and Wednesday at a special conference in Brussels.

The budget includes EUR 50 billion for a 'Connecting Europe Facility' for transport, energy and information and communication technologies (ICT) infrastructure.

There will be an increased focus on sustainable urban development through the earmarking of a minimum of 5% of ERDF resources for sustainable urban development, the establishment of an urban development platform to promote capacity building and exchange of experience, and the adoption of a list of cities where integrated actions for sustainable urban development will be implemented.

Energy Cities, a European Association of local authorities in over 1,000 towns and cities in 30 countries, has campaigned for these developments, and is celebrating their success.

However, in a policy statement they argue that "the Commission’s proposals can still be improved", for instance, by making EU-funding eligibility conditional on "the existence of a local Sustainable Energy Action Plan geared towards the “3x20” objectives".

This is a reference to the three EU aims of reducing EU greenhouse gas emissions by at least 20% below 1990 levels, getting 20% of EU energy consumption from renewable resources, and reducing primary energy use by 20%, all by 2020.

They also call for "the continuation and refinement of the Intelligent Energy-Europe Programme (IEE)", which supports building efficiency, smart grids and sustainable energy.

The plans will be debated by Committee of the Regions members and EU Budget Commissioner Janusz Lewandowski on Tuesday evening, focussing in particular whether they are in line with the investment needs and industrial policies of regions and cities.

On Wednesday, for the first time in history, a minister from one of the BRIC (Brazil, Russia, India, China) countries, Kamal Nath, Indian Minister for Urban Development, will present to the conference the challenges that India is facing on the road to sustainable urban development as part of the 5th EuroIndia Summit on 'Smart, Sustainable and Innovative Cities'.

The Covenant of Mayors is also putting pressure on the European Parliament to take the proposals further by making sure their sustainability aspects become 'embedded' in all Community investments.

The budget was discussed Monday at an Covenant of Mayors Open Day event, and at a webinar on Wednesday (interested participants can sign up by emailing dion.wierts@eumayors.eu), and the topic will be on the agenda at the 3rd Covenant of Mayors’ Ceremony to be held on 29 November at the European Parliament in Brussels.

Stop Hinckley C nuclear power station campaign gets underway

As RWE threatens to follow SSE in pulling out of plans to build a new generation of nuclear power stations in the UK, up to 400 protestors formed a blockade this week to oppose the construction of EDF's Hinkley C plant in Somerset.

Locals and other supporters held a minute's silence on Monday for the victims of the Fukishima fallout, and then released 206 helium balloons, one for each day since the disaster.

Earlier in the previous week a Stop Hinkley camp had been set up four miles away from the blockade site with workshops and speakers, and on Saturday (1st) protestors marched from EDF's offices in Bridgwater around the town.

According to the website, supporters include former LibDem leader Paddy Ashdown, cartoonist Raymond Briggs, actor Julie Christie, Monty Python's Terry Jones, Green MP Caroline Lucas, former Labour Environment Secretary Michael Meacher, and composer John Williams.

Stop New Nuclear spokesperson, Andreas Speck, said the blockade has put the government and EDF on the back foot. "Following the interest this blockade has attracted, both regionally and nationally, the government and EDF can no longer claim that the we need nuclear energy to keep the lights on."

He continued: "Germany has committed to a nuclear-free future without buying nuclear power from France or building new coal-fired power stations. The German government is looking at a decentralised energy model with a mix of renewables and Combined Heat and Power (CHP) to bridge the gap left by withdrawal from nuclear. If Germany can do it, why can’t we?"

Angie Zelter, who in 1996 attacked a Hawk jet being sold in the UK to suppress pro-democracy protests in East Timor (and was cleared of criminal damage), lampooned EDF’s claims that Hinkley Point is sustainable. "Radioactive waste from the proposed new ERP reactors will be so toxic that it will have to be stored on the site for over 100 years. With the growth in extreme weather conditions there is no guarantee that this waste can be stored safely," she said.

The reactor planned for Hinkley C is based on an untested design, a European Pressurized Reactor. It would be the fourth of its type; two others in Finland and France are way over budget, behind schedule and not yet operational.

The one at Flamanville, France, is four years behind and currently estimated to cost twice as much as the original price tag. Two people have died on its construction site and the plant is not expected to go onstream before 2016 at the very earliest.

EDF, the most experienced constructor in the world, has admitted it has not mastered the engineering techniques demanded by the hugely complex and complicated design of the 1,650 MWe reactor.

The Olkiluoto plant in Finland too has seen massive cost overruns and delays, with the Finnish government and Areva now locked in an expensive legal battle.

EDF (Electricité de France) says the preparatory work at Hinckley includes commitments for more than £25 million worth of measures to mitigate the impact of the new build project.

EDF's planning application included the clearing of 420 acres of land, drilling boreholes and concreting the site, but this work will precede any decision by the Infrastructure Planning Committee on whether the full construction can proceed. An application to the IPC is to be submitted later this year.

With its partner Centrica, it has submitted applications for a Nuclear Site Licence.

If it were to go ahead, ot would be the first nuclear power station to be built in the country for over 20 years.

A legal challenge to EDF's nuclear plans is underway, expected to cost up to £15,000. This is a lot for a small group to raise, so please consider donating here.

There is an Environment Agency consultation on radioactive discharges from Hinkley C, open until 15 December. Please send an objection. Click here for a suggested letter of objection.

David Cameron, you must go to Durban this December & end subsidies for fossil fuels

This week David Cameron appeared to play down his party's commitment to tackling climate change by not even mentioning the topic in his keynote speech to the Tory Party conference.

It is unlikely that the shift in rhetorical emphasis will impact on the many commitments and measures in the legislative pipeline, but it may have an impact in two important areas: on investment decisions and on the vital UNFCCC Durban Climate Summit which is fast approaching.

The need for international action has never been more paramount, and it is tremendously important that Cameron is unwavering on the international stage for drastic measures to curb emissions.

The evidence for this is overwhelming. I will discuss some of it, and the single most simple policy that could be implemented to achieve the level of cuts required.

It was announced this week that global carbon dioxide emissions have increased by a staggering 45% since 1990, according to the Emissions Database for Global Atmospheric Research (EDGAR) and other sources.

This puts the world in the region of the high emissions scenarios discussed in the last IPCC report (see below).

At the same time, the International Energy Agency (IEA) and Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) said on Tuesday that subsidies for fossil fuel consumption are actually rising - they totalled $409 billion in 2010, compared to $312 billion in 2009, with oil products having the largest share at $193 billion in 2010 with natural gas getting $91 billion.

Iran and Saudi Arabia were the countries with the biggest subsidies.

The IEA's Chief Economist Fatih Birol said that "without further reform, spending on fossil fuel consumption subsidies is set to reach $660 billion in 2020, or 0.7 percent of global gross domestic product".

Yet leaders of the Group of 20 (G20) countries committed in Pittsburgh in 2009 to phase out these subsidies.

OECD Secretary General Angel Gurria said doing so is an obvious way to save money. "As they (nations) look for policy responses to the worst economic crisis of our lifetimes, phasing out subsidies is an obvious way to help governments meet their economic, environmental and social goals".

It would also cut global energy demand by 4% and considerably reduce carbon emissions growth, the IEA said.

If David Cameron can't find it easy to support a call to phase out the subsidies, and do so himself, then he should tell us why.

(By the way, if you think renewables get too much in the way of subsidies, research published this week in the States shows that nuclear subsidies there at least accounted for more than one percent of the federal budget over the first 15 years of each subsidies’ life; oil and gas subsidies made up half a percent of the total budget, but renewables have amounted to only about a tenth of a percent.)

Using market measures alone is not working as a way of limiting emissions. The 3.5 million EU carbon emissions permits which the UK sold on the market last Thursday went for a price of 10.38 euros each.

This is the lowest price since it started auctions in November 2008, and will not encourage anything like the level of investment needed in greenhouse gas emission abatement technology.

It does strengthen the case for the introduction of a robust carbon price floor, but it also shows other types of action are required.

In a sign of its desperation that the message is not getting through to politicians, the Tyndall Centre this week attempted once more to draw attention to a paper it had first published in a Royal Society journal in 2009, saying that the world could very possibly reach an average global temperature of 4oC higher than pre-industrial levels as early as 2060, with catastrophic consequences for all life on earth.

The paper is peer-reviewed and written by Richard Betts at the Hadley Centre of the Met Office and uses the most accurate and authoritative climate modelling systems currently available.

The Tyndall Centre is based at the University of East Anglia, now famous for the hacked emails scandal, yet exonerated of any bias in its scientific reports by three separate investigations.

(The centre is named after John Tyndall, the man who first discovered the global warming effect 150 years ago - this year marks that anniversary.)

What the paper says

The paper looks at a particular set of scenarios that were considered in the (last) Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) Fourth Assessment Report (AR4), published in 2007. (The 5th is due in 2014.)

AR4's projections suggested that in the absence of mitigation high levels of warming were possible and the median of these was approximately 4?C.

The modelling used at the time did not include certain climate-warming carbon-cycle feedback features, plus more recent measurements that since became available; and the high-emissions scenario - which we now are confident we are within - was not examined with complex general circulation models (GCMs).

Betts' paper looks at this range of scenarios of future greenhouse-gas emissions without policies, including this information.

In other words, looking as best as we can at the world we live in now, in which, year after year, UNFCCC summits come and go and no legally binding agreements are reached.

The paper concludes: "Our best estimate is that a temperature rise of 4?C would be reached in the 2070s, and if carbon-cycle feedbacks are strong, then 4?C could be reached in the early 2060s."

When originally published, the journal did trigger an alarmist headline in the Daily Telegraph with graphic descriptions of how the world would change. It gave fuel to Ed Miliband's efforts to secure a legally bunding deal at Copenhagen. But it did not achieve sufficient global recognition.

I spoke to Asher Minns at the Tyndall Centre and he said he tweeted the paper in an attempt to give it more recognition.

I then spoke to its author, Richard Betts. I asked him whether he could put a figure on the probability of the world reaching this level of warming by that date, and he said "That entirely depends on the policies adopted by politicians".

I asked him about the current state of climate research, and he said that the Hadley Centre "is now working on a huge project coupled climate models with all modelling across the world being run through a commonly agreed protocol, so we know we are comparing like with like, which ones are more or less sensitive to emissions.

"It is mostly work in progress, and will be ready in next year. The deadline is July, and the papers will be accepted by March 2013 for publication in the 2014 report."

The slowness of this work is frustrating for everyone, but science cannot be hurried. I asked Richard if this frustrates him. "No, we have to get it right," he said.

DECC commissions reports from the Hadley Centre, including a paper for the Durban talks that is "more about drawing together information that is already out there into a tight context".

He said the global carbon project will release its annual update in a month, however.

Richard is typical of climate scientists in refusing to be drawn on policy or urgency, saying it is beyond his remit.

"I have no role in saying this is urgent or anything. We have no political objective whatsoever. We are just trying to find the science."

He says all they can do is lay this before politicians. It is up to them to decide how to act.

Does he think that journalists like myself convey the science well?

"In some cases the messages are too simple," he replied. "But our research can be misused either way. It depends on peoples' attitude to risk - people must be informed. But I do think that journalists should convey the science better."

If climate scientists are clear that it is up to politicians to show leadership on the basis of the science, and the science is as clear as it is, then it is incumbent on the consciences of politicians to give these humble toilers on the frontlines of understanding due weight in their deliberations, in comparison to the clamouring of vested interests or focus groups.

In simple language, Mr Cameron: go to Durban. Demonstrate leadership. Cut subsidies to fossil fuels.

Scottish Power to Treasury: give us £0.5bn or we'll ditch flagship CCS project

Electricity generator Scottish Power is threatening to withdraw from a project to build a flagship pilot carbon capture & storage (CCS) facility at Longannet coal-fired power station near Fife, Scotland, unless the Treasury gives it £0.5bn more funding.

If the Treasury can't produce the money, this will be a severe blow to the UK's hopes of becoming a world leader in the technology. Urgent talks are being held between Scottish Power, DECC and the Treasury.

Do you fancy their chances, especially after Osborne's anti-green speech at the Tory Conference? I don't.

The plant is the UK's second largest coal-fired power station and Europe's third largest. If CCS proved to be successful it could capture between seven million and eight million tonnes of carbon dioxide a year and make a serious contribution to tackling the UK's overall emissions.

George Osborne had earmarked £1 billion for the project, but Scottish Power, owned by the Spanish company Iberdrola, is now asking for half as much again. It is supposed to be up-and-running in three years.

A competition to find contenders to build pilot CCS projects was begun in 2007 by the previous Labour administration, and there had been five entrants.

Now the project at Longannet is the only one remaining in the running, since E.On pulled out of constructing a coal-burning power station at Kingsnorth in Kent earlier this year.

Last May, a study by Scottish Enterprise suggested more than 5,000 Scottish jobs could be created by three proposed CCS schemes, including the one at Longannet.

Jeff Chapman, chief executive of the Carbon Capture & Storage Association, remains upbeat, saying that even if this project were not to go ahead, “there are lots of others ready to take its place”.

DECC is still insisting that a way will be found for the project to proceed, and an announcement will be made before the year's end.

It is expected that some of the funding will come from the sale of CO2 permits by the European Investment Bank that are beginning in a month's time.

The Bank is being given 300 million EU carbon permits by the European Commission, which are reserved for new entrants into the EU's emissions trading scheme from 2013, and is being told to sell 20 million units per month through next year in order to raise funds for renewable energy and carbon capture and storage projects in all the member states.

CCS has always been touted by the conventional energy sector as being a vital weapon in the armoury to fight climate change, not least because if successful it would allow 'business-as-usual' to continue without the release of climate-warming gases to the atmosphere.

Critics of the technology have always argued that its cost would prove prohibitive, that it is unproven and would take too long to implement to make a significant dent on global emissions in time to curb dangerous climate change.

The loss of the scheme would also affect proposals for a £3bn CCS-enabled coal-fired power station in Ayrshire, by Ayrshire Power, a company owned by Peel Energy Ltd, to be situated near Hunterston B nuclear power plant.

A coalition of environmental groups that includes WWF, RSPB Scotland, Friends of the Earth, Oxfam, and the Scottish Wildlife Trust had mounted a legal challenge to the plans which a judicial review over-ruled on 4th October.

Developers of several other proposed power plants are also waiting to see if they can be constructed using CCS. Scottish Power itself is hoping to fit it to a new gas turbine power station at Cockenzie in East Lothian, which has also just received planning permission.

Only in June, ScottishPower, National Grid and Shell announced plans to create an onshore pipeline to carry up to two million tonnes of CO2 from Longannet to the North Sea.

Last month the Energy Technologies Institute (ETI) launched a £3m, two-and-a-half year project involving EDF Energy, E.ON, Rolls-Royce and Petrofac, to create a modelling tool-kit capable of simulating the operation of all aspects of the CCS chain, from capture and transport to storage.

ETI Chief Executive Dr David Clarke believes that “around a third of the UK’s electricity could be generated from coal, gas, biomass or hydrogen turbines fitted with CCS by 2050".

“CCS infrastructure is complex," he says, "and will need to be rolled out rapidly to meet those targets."

The ETI has already announced £29m worth of CCS projects, including a next generation capture demonstration project led by Costain and an appraisal of the UK’s potential storage sites led by Senergy. Scottish Power has had funding to scope out its own projects.

The ETI is also commissioning a project to develop and demonstrate cheaper carbon capture technologies specifically for gas fired power stations. An announcement on who will carry out the work on this project is expected in early 2012.

There are several different types of CCS technology, depending on whether it is retrofitted to an existing plant or intrinsic to a new-build, and depending on the fuel burnt.

Costs can be reduced if the gas is used to help extract more oil and gas from the North Sea fields into which it is pumped. The most optimistic studies put a figure of £150bn on the amount of fuel that could be obtained in this manner.