British electric supercar breaks land speed record

The first electric super car, the ‘Nemesis’, designed and built entirely in the UK, has today broken the UK electric car land-speed record, reaching a verified speed of 148 mph.

Nemesis is a battery-powered electric sports car developed by renewable energy company Ecotricity's MD Dale Vince.

As it sped up the runway at Elvington Airfield near York, it made no sound at all apart from wind resistance and tyre noise.

The previous record of 137mph was set by Don Wales, the grandson of legendary speed-merchant Sir Malcolm Campbell.

It was driven by estate agent Nick Ponting, 21, from Gloucester, who attained an average speed of 148.419mph during two runs along the mile-long course.

He said the torque was amazing, giving excellent acceleration response right up to top speed.

Further attempts are being made today, and Dale Vince is convinced that the 150 mile an hour barrier will be broken.

"It was quite straightforward. We're putting a bit of juice back in the batteries and we're going to go again. We built the Nemesis to smash the stereotype of electric cars as something Noddy would drive - slow, boring, not cool," he said.

Joe Wales, son of Don, attempted to beat his father's record in a car named Bluebird Electric at Pendine Sands in Carmarthenshire last year, but failed when its suspension was damaged by a pothole.

Industry calls for greater support for decarbonisation

 As George Osborne vows to cut support for onshore wind, business leaders call for the opposite.

Business leaders have called upon the government to provide a more stable, consistent and sufficiently long term set of policies to enable the transition to a low carbon economy.

In a new report by think tank IPPR, Growing pains: British industry and the low-carbon transition, which is based upon conversations with senior executives in many sectors at the forefront of this transition, the leaders also call for specific industrial strategies targeted at the different sectors.

The findings suggest there are plenty of opportunities for British companies to participate in this fast growing global business sector. According to figures to be released next week by WWF, in their annual Clean Economy, Living Planet report, in 2011, the global sales value of greentech manufacturing, from manufacturing inputs like silicon to end products like biofuels, came to €198 billion ($245.3 billion), double the figure in 2008.

Reg Plant, one of the authors of the IPPR report, put an even higher value, of £2.27tn, on the global market for wider environmental goods and services, and said it was growing by 4% a year.

“The government should work far more closely with industry," say the business leaders, in order to counteract the perception that its policies are muddled, overlapping, continually being changed, and not farsighted enough, particularly for the period after 2020. All sectors considered mid-term targets (to 2030) to be important, for providing greater clarity and consistency with current investment timeframes.

Support for onshore windpower

The Government continued to give mixed signals to industry over the weekend, with the news that George Osborne was seeking to reduce the level of Renewables Obligation support for onshore wind power, after April 2013, by five or ten per cent more than that which had been proposed by the Department For Energy and Climate Change, due to pressure from backbench Tory MPs.

Tim Yeo, Conservative leader of the Select Committee for Environment and Climate Change, led the criticism of this move by saying that it made absolutely no financial sense to do this, since "you get more carbon reduction for your money by subsidising onshore wind than you do by subsidising the more expensive offshore wind power".

One British company which would be affected by such a savage and politically motivated cut in support for onshore wind, is David Brown Gear Systems, which has been manufacturing gear sets for 150 years and is based in Huddersfield and West Bromwich. The company has found the wind sector to be a core market for the business, last year receiving a £2 million grant from the regional growth fund to invest in a state-of-the-art R&D centre for wind gearbox technologies.

Carbon price floor

Amongst other Treasury policies that business leaders say should be amended or scrapped is the carbon price floor. Currently, this is specifically designed to encourage investment in nuclear power which, they say, would skew precious investment at a less effective technology. "It is ill-designed as it reduces British competitiveness, won't cut emissions and will drive up fuel bills pushing more people into fuel poverty," said Reg Plant.

Call for more partnerships

Business leaders also call in the report for “strategic public-private partnerships at the sector level based on the model successfully pioneered by the Automotive Council", which brings together leading industry players, policymakers and expert academics. This would help to identify and tackle barriers to development such as infrastructure, skills and financing requirements.

Many leaders criticise the Carbon Reduction Commitment and called again for an industry-by-industry approach to emissions reductions, with incentives such as support for research and development.

Business leaders also think that greater collaboration with European partners on low carbon innovation is advisable, to target possible technological breakthroughs. Pooling member state resources and encouraging countries and businesses to work together is cost-effective, attractive to investors and could deliver greater returns.

The UK is already doing this in the areas of carbon capture and storage (CCS) and offshore wind but the pace of change should be speeded up, they say. One way of doing this is with the help of a new European programme modelled on the governance structure of the EU's NER 300 programme, which subsidises installations of innovative renewable energy technology and CCS, and is funded by a set-aside of 300 million allowances from the European Emissions Trading Scheme.

Transport sector

Government support is also called for to help the transport sector, which is responsible for 21% of the UK's emissions, to decarbonise. In particular, despite government efforts by the offer of a grant of up to £5000 to purchase an electric vehicle, there has been little effect on the market, partly due to the high upfront cost but also to the lack of charging infrastructure.

There is also a lack of tax harmonisation on vehicles across EU member states, leading to the fact that the same car model can be effectively taxed at different rates in different countries. But addressing this issue would pose a huge political challenge, since taxation policy is largely a matter for individual states.

Several leaders called for greater integration between the energy and transport roadmaps, which would include “explicit modelling of the consequences of the electrification of transport for the electricity and gas sectors", otherwise, if the grid was not decarbonised fast enough, more electric vehicles on the roads could increase carbon emissions.

Manufacturing sector

In the manufacturing sector, the vast majority of executives interviewed for the study were ignorant of the long-term vision set out in the various EU 2050 roadmaps. This uncertainty, say the report's authors, “could reflect the increasingly short-term perspective within which many manufacturers operate".

In principle, however, when it was explained to them, participants supported the roadmaps because they provided policy direction and milestones that businesses can work towards.

A particular incentive for the manufacturing sector would be a type of 'green deal', which would help them to invest in low carbon and energy efficient technologies. A pilot scheme for small and medium-sized manufacturers should be established as a first step.

One company involved in energy is Ceres Power, a spin-off from Imperial College which manufactures fuel cell technology for use in small-scale combined heat and power systems. Despite having identified a market of 14.5 million households in the UK and aiming for a market launch in 2014, it sees its next step as being far from straightforward. It requires a significant injection of capital to finalise product development and scale up its manufacturing, which would normally come via equity finance.

But as a result of the economic downturn this has proved difficult, so it is now investigating corporate venturing, which means partnering with a large energy utility or manufacturer. Even this is difficult and, to make things easier, it is calling for the Treasury to introduce “more tax incentives for corporate investments in SMEs, together with any capital gains and dividends from these investments".

All in all, the report paints a picture of an industry full of enthusiasm, but continually frustrated by the slow pace of change and inconsistent support from government.

Low Carbon Innovation Survey

Coincidentally, in June and July, the Department of Energy and Climate Change (DECC) is surveying firms on their levels of investment in innovations that result in reductions in greenhouse gas emissions. DECC says it is also keen to investigate drivers of and barriers to investment. This will help inform the development of future innovation support programmes.

DECC says it is keen to hold brief telephone interviews with a wide range of companies active in the low carbon sector. If you would be interested in taking part in this survey, please enter your details here. If you would like further details about the survey, please contact William Lecky in the Energy Innovation team at DECC (William.Lecky@decc.gsi.gov.uk, 0300 068 5080).

Richer, educated drivers are most eco-aware AND pollute more!

What type of driver are you? The Government is struggling to guess your transport emissions, and has found that higher income, highly educated drivers are usually more pro-environment, but this is at odds with their behaviour.

The Department for Transport has divided the population up by type according to what kind of driver they are in order to better understand how it can target messages to encourage them to use transport in a way that reduces their personal emissions of climate-warming gases.

The categories are divided into those who own cars and those who don't. So which category do you come under? In the first sector there are six categories:
1. Town and rural heavy car use (13% of population). Mostly live in the country but also in towns and own the most - and largest - cars, and travel most. Rate speed/performance and style/design highly in car buying.
2. Educated suburban families (17% of population). Of working age, with kids, they travel and drive a lot, and are the most likely to travel by plane. Like the idea of cycling, but distances and safety put them off. Care about climate change but have high travel needs.
3. Affluent empty nesters (9% of population) - Older, largely retired, well educated, do the average numbers of car trips. Are most likely segment to buy new cars. Care about the environment but unsure about climate change.
4. Less affluent older sceptics (12% of population). Generally older, find it easy to get around but travel less. Not so well educated and even more unsure about climate change.
5. Less affluent urban young families (21% of population). While needing to travel less and so less reliant on car use, they aspire to own a larger/faster car but can't afford it. Less well educated, more ambivalent about climate change.
6. Older, less mobile car owners (9% of population). Find it hard to get out and about but are heavily reliant on the car.

There are three categories of non-car owners:
7. Urban low income without cars (5% of population). Younger, low earners, low education, high levels of unemployment, they are reliant on walking and public transport. Would like a car but cannot afford one.
8. Young urbanites without cars (7% of population). Younger, well educated, big city-dwellers. Heavily reliant on walking and public transport to get around. Don't need a car.
9. Elderly without cars (6% of population). Very low travel needs, have difficulty getting around but don't need to travel far, relying on lifts from friends and public transport.

The Department of Transport made these categories to help them work out their differences in terms of the factors relevant to reducing CO2 emissions from personal transport use, in order to develop more targeted and effective sustainable transport schemes.

The study is based on 3,923 face-to-face interviews conducted with adults living in England.

The findings dug up some interesting - if sometimes unsurprising - information, such as:
• higher income groups showed less sustainable transport behaviour, tending to own more - and larger - cars, travel by car more often, and travel further. They are also likely to fly by plane more often.
• the better educated tend to hold more ‘pro-environmental’ attitudes.
• this means there is a disparity between their attitudes and behaviour; although higher income, highly educated respondents tended to be more pro-environment, their behaviour is less sustainable in terms of their actual transport use than the lower earning, less well educated.
• country-dwellers use cars the most - and like them the most, while disliking public transport and cycling.
• older people cycled less.

The research unfortunately didn't show up a significant number of voluntary 'down-sizers'.

Drivers for change

The survey findings highlight the great extent to which car owners travel by car out of habit and how most car buyers, particularly older ones, tend to buy the same type of car each time.

To encourage them to change their behaviour will mean helping them to think about what they are currently doing, the ways they are doing it and how and why they should change (which are not to be under-estimated) and/or to design infrastructure and services in ways which enable/encourage behaviour change without such thinking being required.

The study recommends that for all nine categories, encouraging trip avoidance and 'fixing' sustainable means of getting from A to B are the best bets for reducing emissions - offering cost and time savings without significantly impinging on people’s lifestyle and habits.

Among the car-owners, buying fuel-efficient vehicles and adopting fuel-efficient driving techniques also offer considerable potential. However, it notes that these should be the more efficient vehicles rather than the most efficient vehicles because the latter tend to be more expensive (e.g. hybrid and electric cars).

Looking more closely at the type of driver most likely to be a reader of this magazine, educated suburban families are seen as relatively aware of the impact of transport on climate change and are willing to change their behaviour.

However, they think that it's mostly up to the government to set an example and provide the infrastructure to help them change, rather than to make changes themselves.

When buying a new car, they are the most likely to say that environmental considerations/low CO2 emissions are important to them, and they are among the least likely to select speed/performance. This makes them a priority group for efforts to increase cycling.

As for affluent empty nesters, as they are among the most well-off, and they have, at least in theory, the financial resources and a reasonable degree of flexibility to make changes to the way they travel.

However, this may be limited by where they live – around half of them are in rural areas, meaning that public transport services are less likely to cover the routes travelled.

Walking and cycling may be less of an option. However they may be encouraged to walk some, shorter, journeys, particularly if the health benefits are highlighted.

These people also tend to travel by car out of habit, which suggests that initiatives to encourage them to buy smaller, more fuel efficient vehicles may be most effective.

Governments must work harder to avoid global catastrophe

Governments of developed countries must work harder to secure a climate pact to succeed the Kyoto Protocol, and avoid an approximately 3.2 degrees rise in average global temperatures this century.

Christiana Figueres, head of the U.N. Climate Change Secretariat, made this call last Friday, at the end of two weeks of fraught and only slightly productive climate talks in Bonn.

Bonn Climate Change Conference June 2011
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"There is a growing realisation and acknowledgment that resolving the future of the Kyoto Protocol is essential this year and will require high level political guidance," Figueres said.

Ambassador Jorge Arguello of Argentina, Chairman of the Group of 77 and China (G77) agreed, adding, "The chance to reach a successful outcome in Durban to consolidate and strengthen the climate change framework still depends on the level of political will that Parties can show."

Durban is the location of the next top level meeting in November/December. The EU and others have now conceded that an all-encompassing agreement on binding carbon emissions is unlikely to be achieved there.

What is the scientific position?

According to Climate Action Tracker, based on current commitments by nations, the world is headed for an approximately 3.2 degrees rise in average temperatures this century.

Dr. Sivan Kartha, senior scientist at the Stockholm Environment Institute (SEI), said that while developing countries have made credible commitments to address their part of the emissions gap, developed countries' promises are such that, with the current accounting loopholes on the table, their emissions could actually increase when they should be rapidly declining.

"You can't negotiate with science," he said. "You can't negotiate with the Earth's natural limits. At the moment, emission reduction pledges take us far over those limits."

Some progress made

The Kyoto Protocol remains fundamental and critical to success because it "establishes the key rules to quantify and monitor the mitigation efforts of countries" and "contains the market-based mechanisms which allow countries to reach their mitigation levels at cost effective levels," Figueres said in her concluding remarks to the conference.

"Climate [change talks] are the most important negotiations the world has ever seen, but governments, business and civil society cannot solve it in one meeting," she added, in response to criticism that progress is too slow.

Some progress was made at Bonn, on technical issues such as designing a scheme for sharing clean energy technologies, on a system for the measurement, reporting and verification (MRV) of national emissions, on the financing of a $100bn-a-year Green Climate Fund to support adaptation and emission reduction efforts in developing countries, as well as in forest protection and carbon markets.

Despite this, developing nations are feeling that they must resign themselves to expect a weaker deal from the developed world.

"This process is dead in the water," commented Yvo de Boer, former head of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) during the talks. "It's not going anywhere".

Pablo Solon, head of Bolivia's delegation added that "there has been no advance in the substantive issue of pledges for reductions in emissions" by developed nations.

The minimum goal envisaged by developing nations is for a core group, led by the European Union, to extend the Kyoto Protocol.

Canada, Japan and Russia have all said they will not sign up to a second commitment period, and the world's two largest greenhouse gas emitters - China and the United States - are not bound by the Protocol. This leaves the European nations as the keystone nations upholding it.

During negotiations, the EU was challenged to sign up to the second period unilaterally, but the European Commission negotiator, Jurgen Lefevere, said renewal of the Kyoto Protocol alone "is not going to cut it", since it accounts for just eleven percent of world greenhouse gases. "We need a solution for the remaining 89 per cent as well," he observed.

The problem of transport

There is one big issue on which China and the United States, the world痴 two biggest emitters, agree: they both oppose the EU's scheme to regulate and reduce emissions from air and marine transport (known as 澱unker emissions.

These emissions were excluded from the Kyoto Protocol because countries could not agree on what to do about them.

They are the subject of a UNFCCC working group which made little progress at Bonn, as they are stalled pending the result of a legal case.

Earlier this year, the EU has got fed up with waiting for these sectors to take action on reducing their own emissions and proposed that they be included in the revised EU Emissions Trading Scheme (EU-ETS) from 1 January 2012.

China and four US airlines are challenging this in the courts and the European Court of Justice is to hear the case in July. The Court will probably not issue its judgment before the EU-ETS enters into effect. Until it does, the UNFCCC working group feels it cannot move forward.

Meanwhile, a proposed objective to cut the EU's transport emissions by 60% by 2050 was considered "too ambitious" by a majority of the EU's 27 transport ministers, meeting in Luxembourg last week, who want the goal to remain aspirational. They believe it would disadvantage European companies compared with their competitors in Asia or the US.

"In order to maintain the Union's competitiveness, similar commitments should be sought at international level. Today there are no alternative to fossil fuels [that is] competitive in terms of technology and price," ministers admitted in a statement.

It is the newer Eastern European members who are the most opposed to a binding 60% target. Others, such as Austria, believe it is achievable and should even be increased.

Soil carbon

Observers at the talks reported that some countries were introducing new market-based proposals such as 'soil carbon' markets into the negotiations which were unproven and had delayed the talks.

Michele Maynard, Policy and Advocacy Officer of thePan African Climate Justice Alliance (PACJA) said, "These markets are a false solution that will only fuel the land-grab in Africa and seriously undermine the ability of poor Africans to feed themselves."

Kate Horner, senior analyst at Friends of the Earth (US) said the United States continues blocking progress on the most important issues in negotiations, including how they will meet their pledges to the Green Fund.

"Perhaps the biggest contribution the US government could make to these talks would be to cut the carbon of sending people to negotiations who refuse to negotiate," she said.

What happens next

The next major milestone is the 17th Conference of the Parties of the UNFCCC and the 7th Conference of the Parties to the Kyoto Protocol, to be held in Durban, South Africa, in November /December 2011.

Before then, there will be a meeting about the Green Fund in Tokyo in July. A ministerial conference is planned for 2 to 3 July in Berlin, and ministers will also meet approximately a month ahead of the UN Climate Change Conference in South Africa.

South Africa is also considering a third ministerial consultation this year, and the incoming South African presidency and the current Mexican presidency are planning to engage heads of state and governments on the margins of the UN General Assembly in New York in September.

Can biofuels fuel our transport needs?

By 2050, biofuels could provide 27% of total transport fuel, supplementing diesel, kerosene and jet fuel while avoiding emissions of around 2.1 gigatonnes (Gt) of CO2 emissions per year - but only if produced sustainably, according to a new International Energy Agency (IEA) roadmap published today.

But biofuels aren't the only fuel - electric vehicles are taking to the road too, and yesterday saw the publication of a new UK Low Carbon Automotive Directory to promote UK expertise in the area for export.

What we do about transport to make it sustainable is the thorniest question facing us as we try to steer our high-energy way of life towards a more climate-friendly future.

The kind of answer arrived at affects the degree to which lifestyles, accustomed or aspiring to the freedom of movement that cars, planes, buses and trains currently offer, can continue into the future.

The IEA technology roadmap, Biofuels for Transport is positive, and provides an excellent overview of many of the fuelstocks and conversion technologies, from those in full commercial production now, to those which are just in R&D.

It also examines their carbon balance and overall sustainability, which is crucial to minimising the impact of travel.

However, it does not cover everything - it is relatively quiet on aviation fuel and in particular on jatropha. This is a plant which grows on land otherwise unusable for farming, makes biodiesel, and was recently tested by Japan Airlines, Air New Zealand, Continental, Brazil's TAM Airlines and Mexican carrier Interjet with Airbus.

A peer-reviewed Yale University study says it could reduce greenhouse gas emissions from flying by up to 60%.

140,000 formerly impoverished farmers in India are now earning a living cultivating the crop without compromising food supply or food pricing - which makes it highly sustainable. India aims to meet 20% of its diesel demand with fuel derived from plants rather than fossils by 2017.

The IEA report is also weak on the multiple benefits of algae-farming. Algae produces biodiesel while absorbing carbon dioxide from the atmosphere and processing sewage, and proposals have been made to grow it alongside industrial plants which emit the greenhouse gas. The process also produces a fertiliser and clean water.

A recent report in the New Scientist on the subject does highlight physical limits to how much we could make, but of course the fuel-source is only one amongst many.

Can we produce enough sustainable biofuels?

The IEA study says most conventional biofuel technologies need to improve conversion efficiency, cost and overall sustainability, and that current advanced, second-generation biofuels need to be commercially deployed.

We must be fully confident that the life-cycle impacts of these products do not compromise food security and biodiversity, and yield positive social impacts. This includes sustainable land-use management and certification schemes, as well as support measures that promote 斗ow-riskfeedstocks and efficient processing technologies.

The report calculates the land area requirements for biofuel feedstock, at around 100 million hectares (Mha) in 2050 - a considerable challenge given competition for land and feedstocks from rapidly-growing demand for food and fibre.

But it concludes this should be possible, and provide the required 145 EJ of total biomass for biofuels, heat and electricity from crop residues and wastes, along with sustainably grown energy crops.

Will it be expensive?

The IEA roadmap says that scale and efficiency improvements will reduce costs to make most biofuels competitive with fossil fuels by 2030.

The investment costs seem high - production costs from 2010 to 2050 in this roadmap are $11 trillion to $13 trillion, but the marginal savings or additional costs compared to use of gasoline/diesel are in the range of only +/-1% of total costs for all transport fuels - and this is without factoring in the externalities of environmental damage avoided from not using fossil fuels.

UK leadership

The UK is a pioneer in many aspects of low carbon vehicles, well-placed to profit from the global shift to sustainable transport. The updated UK Low Carbon Automotive Directory has been produced to help boost the export market for this emerging sector.

It lists suppliers, partners and new solutions from the UK's businesses and research institutions in areas such as manufacturing, components, transmissions & drive trains, energy recovery & storage (batteries and flywheels), electrical recharging infrastructure, fuels & infrastructure and hydrogen and fuel cells.

The sector is supported by the BIS Automotive Unit with the DfT's Office for Low Emission Vehicles (OLEV) and LowCVP.

Crucial to fostering UK success is Cenex - the UK's first Centre of Excellence for low carbon and fuel cell technologies.

Cenex has just launched its website allowing registration for the key trade show for the sector, LCV2011, the 4th annual Low Carbon Vehicle event which will take place on 7th and Thursday 8th September 2011.

Navigating the route to a low-carbon travel is tricky, but the encouraging message is that it is potentially achievable.

Proposed EU carbon tax to be blocked by Britain

A draft directive obliging European member states to set minimum rates of CO2 taxes at Euros 20 per tonne for diesel and coal used for transport and heating from 2013 is likely to be blocked by Britain, where fuel prices are already high.

The draft revision of the Energy Tax Directive, which includes a carbon tax and is to be presented today, proposes separate carbon dioxide and consumption taxes on the fuels, linked to inflation which would be adjusted every three years.

It would compel EU states by 2020 to institute taxation of fuels based on their energy content and CO2 emissions, rather than the volume-based system currently used.

This would create higher taxes for energy-intensive fuel such as coal and diesel, adding around 8% to a litre of diesel and encouraging a switch to diesel.

But "the aim is not to increase rates for diesel," Commission spokesman David Boublil told journalists on Monday. "The plan is that we should put all fuels on the same footing ... It will mean an adjustment to make sure they are taxed in the same way."

The Commission argues that big prices hikes are not likely as many national governments like the UK already set diesel taxes above the EU minimum of Euros 330 per 1000 litres, and therefore they do not have to pass the tax on to consumers.

Diesel currently attracts lower taxation rates than petrol. Consequently, much of Europe's commercial fleets use the cheaper fuel, including most hauliers. A switch to petrol would not only improve CO2 emissions but local air quality as well, improving people's health.

The aims of the tax

According to Algirdas Šemeta, the EU Commissioner for Taxation and Customs Union, Audit and Anti-Fraud, the proposals are not so much to do with creating a new tax as about restructuring existing taxation (with a CO2-tax element) to meet the EU痴 climate change, energy efficiency and fair competition goals, shifting taxation from labour. They have three objectives:

1. to introduce two elements in the rate structure: one based on CO2 emissions and another based on the energy contents of each product. These objective criteria for taxation will provide for a consistent treatment of the energy sources and energy consumers


2. the CO2 element will provide a framework for Member States to apply CO2 taxation in areas currently missed by the EU Emission Trading System


3. it will create an appropriate framework for taxing renewable energies, in particular biofuels, reflecting their lower CO2 emissions and energy content.

British opposition

But British MEPs are known to be sympathetic to the motor lobby in the UK, which is strongly opposed to the proposed tax. The Automobile Association has said it would be "madness" to introduce it at the current time of high fuel prices - even though it would not take affect for a few years.

Under European Commission voting rules, opposition from any single state can kill the move.

"We're not going to support new measures in this area," a British EU diplomat said. "Taking into account the opposition of other states as well, it is certainly one we would oppose and that therefore points you towards what we might do in the Council."

The UK motor lobby's position is contradicted by the facts. The UK has always had the highest diesel taxes in Europe - the same level as petrol. But, largely due to the fall of the pound against the euro, UK fuel taxes have dropped by a 32% since their high point in 2000.

But UK MEP Jacqueline Foster, the Conservative transport spokesperson in the European Parliament, still disagrees with the move: "We all want to reduce CO2 emissions from vehicles but it should be done by placing incentives on people, not by clobbering them," she said. "With so many goods transported by road, further increases in fuel costs will send inflation soaring."

Geoff Dunning, chief executive of Britain's Road Haulage Association, agreed: "the price of fuel has already gone through the roof. To add to that would be madness. It would cripple the British economy."

The draft law also calls for the abolition of special low rate for 'red' diesel, used by the farming and fishery industries. This has brought howls of outrage from the National Farmers Union.

Supporters of the move argue that since any price increases would not enter into force until 2018, by which time it should have encouraged the shift to less polluting petrol, it will not affect the current economic situation.

Taxes are lower now

A new report from the think-tank Transport and Environment (T&E) adds weight to those who see a need for change. It claims that "the average fuel tax levied on road fuels in the old EU15 is in real terms 10 Euro cents per litre lower today than it was in 1999".

This means that "had governments not let fuel taxes slip but kept them constant, CO2 emissions of EU27 road transport would have been some 6%, or 60 Mtonnes, lower, and today's oil imports would have been Euro 11bn lower. If the additional Euro 32bn revenues had been spent on lowering labour taxes, roughly 350,000 jobs could have been created."

The report adds, "Compared with other regions in the world like the US, China or Japan, the EU has relatively high fuel taxes. In many ways this is a major strength for the EU's economic and environmental performance as (among other things) it lowers CO2 emissions and oil demand because, contrary to popular belief, taxing fuel brings down consumption. In the long run, 10% higher fuel prices reduce the overall fuel consumption of cars by 6 to 8%, and of lorries by 2 to 6%."

T&E's director, Jos Dings, does think the Directive is wrong on biofuels, which it wants to exempt completely from taxation. "Biofuels are not zero carbon. Their performance varies widely and we would like to see their taxes reflect their actual performance and not by default a zero rating."

Also, "on the air and maritime transport side, it is very disappointing that the Commission has not had the guts to end the prohibition on fuel taxation in those sectors."

Don't let them relax uranium transport rules!

About 20 million packages of all sizes containing radioactive materials are transported around the world annually on public road, railways and ships.

With the comeback of nuclear power, there is an increasing demand for transportation of radioactive materials.

Wisely, regulations have been in place to strictly control their movement. But the industry is now complaining of bottlenecks and delays.

This is compounded by the fact that, sensibly, fewer and fewer transporters want to deal with the hazardous materials. Moeller Maersk, the world's largest container shipping line measured on vessel capacity, adopted a policy of not shipping radioactive materials in April 2007.

"It is a very complex problem," said Bernard Monot, external relations vice president at the logistics department of the world's biggest maker of nuclear reactors, Areva.

"The shippers complain about the port authorities, who in turn hold the shipping lines responsible and everybody accuses heavy regulations," he says.

So they want the rules cut.

For example in Holland, "It takes around six weeks to receive a permit," according to Pyter Hiemstra, spokesman for SenterNovem, the agency handling permits on behalf of the Dutch Department of Spatial Planning, Housing and Environment.

He said the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) had asked countries to speed this up.

"What we would be looking for is for radioactive to be accepted for transit permission normally with 24 to 48 hours notice," said John Leach, General Manager for Dangerous Cargo, Special Cargo Management at Moeller Maersk.

The Low Carbon Kid argues hat the last thing we need is a relaxing of rule around the transport of radioactive materials. The world is a dangerous enough place as it is.

It is governments and local authorities and port authorities who control these rules. Write to your MP and ask them not to let these rules be relaxed.

What is sustainable about this transport policy?

The sustainability of transport in the UK comes down to one thing - can we all maintain or improve our quality of life and tackle climate change in the way we move from A to B (or, indeed, decide not to).

The Government has just laid out its ideas on this in Towards a Sustainable Transport System: Supporting Economic Growth in a Low Carbon World. This is a consultation document that will lead to a new Transport White Paper in a year's time.

It is a brave document in that it dares to question whether new major infrastructure projects are a good idea, but still pledges support for airport expansion in southeast England.

It also wants to speed up motorways and rail links between London, Birmingham and Manchester.

Its attempt to be "sustainable" rests partly on a pledge to ensure that "every extra tonne of carbon from aviation growth above 2005 levels would need to be matched by a tonne saved somewhere else - a saving over and above existing targets".

This is code for emissions trading, and means we can carry on as usual, while investing in renewable energy in developing countries, but this does nothing to reduce the overall level of GHG entering the atmosphere.

We are back with Catch-23.

Basically economic growth and sustainability are incompatible. It's like trying to get cats and mice to get on with each other.

So in short, the Low Carbon Kid says there's not much sustainable about such a transport policy.

He will write another time about how saving money by energy efficiency doesn't result in saving nearly as much energy as you'd thnk because the money saved is usually spent on other things that also use energy.

Catch-23 again.

Meanwhle, the logic from all of this leads to the conclusion that only one thing will reduce our overall energy use: personal carbon trading with a yearly reduced overall cap.

This will be because there will no possible way to use more energy. No choice. Nada.

Like the spoilt child, we should be banned from playing with our dangerous toys, and learn to do more with less.

It's the only way.

Miliband's complacency

The Planning White Paper has been attacked by many on the grounds that it would increase, not reduce, overall greenhouse emissions

This is because it will permit fast-tracking of motorway widening, new ports, runways, bypasses and so on.

The overall climate impact of all of this has, unbelievably, not been calculated by the government despite "lip service" to the topic in the white paper.

Nevertheless, at Hay-on-Wye Literature Festival, David Miliband asserted that the central philosophy of the government's climate change programme is that "as long as overall emissions from the UK come down it doesn't matter where the cuts are made” and therefore transport emissions could continue to rise without necessarily contradicting policy.

Such complancy is shocking. How can he know that overall emissions will come down if the impact of the planned transport expansions haven't been calculated?

The plans will make it easier for homeowners to install microgeneration, but grants for these are pitifully few and low. You have to be rich to do it like David Cameron.

The Low Carbon Buildings Programme (LCBP) has just received and from yesterday made available an extra £11.9m for housdeholders' solar, wind, groundsource etc.. power. This will last a month and then that's it.

What a way to support the renewables industry and meet the overwhelming public demand.

> Respond to the Planning consultation
The deadline for responses is 17 August.