healthier, happier and richer

Anyone who cares about the survival of human civilisation should read this book. It is packed with facts and statistics about solutions, and shows that we must stop arguing about which is cheapest or best, because we need all of them.

Our website, Climateanswers.info, is broadly split up into three: technological answers, political answers and behavioural answers.

Why have we done this?

Well, this site is really about actions and not prohibitions – what we can do, rather than just what we shouldn’t. We do not wear hair shirts at Climate Answers and we are born optimists!

The Labour Party came to power in 1997 committed to devolving powers to Scotland and Wales, and re-creating a London-wide government. It was also determined to improve the political situation in Northern Ireland and was willing to use devolution to achieve this. Therefore, the last 12 years have seen considerable change to the constitution of the UK. Climate change was not a driving force behind any of this, but, nevertheless, the new tiers of government have had significant impact on what the UK is doing.

Last week, I went to Chile to take part in a conference about energy policy – mainly about whether Chile should build nuclear power stations. The current Chilean government has been discussing nuclear energy for the last three years, but has not said yes or no.

Some good news – or at least good promises – from Gordon Brown. In his first interview since the G20, he told The Independent that this month’s Budget will make the UK “a world leader” in manufacturing, using and exporting electric and hybrid vehicles, and also lighter, more fuel-efficient petrol cars.

The UK has enormous wind potential, and is already the world leader in terms of installed offshore capacity. However, it achieved this with only 688Mw of operational offshore wind farms.

The need to reduce greenhouse gas emissions is usually referred to as ‘decarbonisation’. Jonathan Porritt, the chairman of the UK Sustainable Development Commission, thinks that it is better to call it “re-solarisation”, because this is positive and solar power has immense potential.

On Monday, 13 July 2009, Ed Miliband, the UK Energy and Climate Change Secretary, opened the Little Cheyne Court wind farm in Kent. With a capacity of just under 60Mw, this is the largest wind farm in South East England.

“Climate change is the biggest global health threat of the 21st century.”

These are the opening words of an editorial and also a major report published this week in the Lancet and University College London Institute for Global Health Commission.

Presidents Hu and Obama met today in Beijing and climate change was high on the agenda. China and the US are now the two largest producers of greenhouse gas emissions, responsible for over a third of total annual global emissions – though the US has caused 30% of the total historical contribution, whereas China has contributed just 7%, and US per capita emissions are 23.5 tons, whereas China’s are 5.5 tons.

Opponents of nuclear power often claim that supporting nuclear will inevitably mean that renewables will suffer. However, the evidence from France shows this need not be the case.

Spain and South Africa both have lots of coal, but no significant oil or gas. Yet their responses to the energy security issues this raises have been dramatically different.

On 24 June 2009, the UK government announced that the UK aims to have installed 33Gw of offshore wind by 2020, generating a quarter of the UK electricity needs. But it won’t be cheap.

Yesterday, I attended a talk by Pat McFadden, a minister in the UK’s Business Department, about how the UK should move to a low-carbon economy. His main point was that the UK is still a manufacturing economy, despite the common view that everything manufactured is now imported. He also talked about the enormous opportunity for people in the UK to make wind turbines.

China now emits 18% of total global greenhouse gases. This is the same as the USA – possibly more. So, it is obviously essential to engage the Chinese people, government and businesses over climate control. But this doesn’t mean that China and the US (or Europe) are equally ‘responsible’.

The UK has reduced total greenhouse gas emissions since 1990 by 15%. However, this has not primarily been achieved by government policies introduced to protect the climate.

Yesterday I went to Brussels for a seminar on CCS with Ruud Lubbers, who used to be prime minister of the Netherlands and is now running the Rotterdam Climate Initiative.

The lack of substantial progress at Copenhagen, though not unexpected, has left many people close to despondency on climate change. There is now a serious danger that they will lose interest. More worrying is the danger that the media will lose interest, leading to politicians doing likewise.

Russia produces 5% of annual global greenhouse gasses and is responsible for 8% of the historic contribution. Its per capita annual emissions are about 14 tons, compared to 12 in Germany, 11 in the UK and 5.5 in China (but 24 in the USA).

On Wednesday and Thursday, I attended a conference on renewable energy in Scotland, on the stunningly beautiful island Skye. I talked about how to dispel myths about climate change and renewables.

The Copenhagen Climate Summit starts today. Prospects are looking better than they were a few weeks ago and the fact that President Obama has decided to attend the final negotiating session, rather than just for a token visit at the start, is excellent.

Scotland has immense potential to expand renewables, particularly wind and the Scottish National Party (SNP), when it took over the Scottish government in 2007, set a target that half of all Scotland’s electricity should come from renewables by 2020.

2009 is in danger of being remembered as the year of the Copenhagen ‘failure’ and Obama’s failure to get a cap-and-trade bill through the US Senate. However, it should be remembered as a year when, despite extremely difficult economic conditions, major polluting countries made substantial progress in expanding wind energy.

Yesterday, the G8 countries promised to cut their greenhouse emissions by 80% by 2050, and to limit global warming to no more than two degrees centigrade. This is better than nothing but less than is needed.

Germany led the world on wind energy until 2007. In 2008, it was overtaken in terms of total installed capacity, though not percentage of energy coming from wind, by the USA. It remains the world’s top photovoltaic (PV) installer, accounting for almost half of the global market in 2007 – though this generates only about 1% of total electricity used in Germany.

No form of electricity generation is entirely free of carbon emissions. So just how carbon free are the main types?

There are several myths or misunderstandings that have grown up surrounding climate change and renewable energy. Both sides of the debate can be at fault. This article tries to debunk some of nonsense that is often cited as fact.

How well have Obama and Energy Secretary Chu done so far on promoting energy efficiency, renewables, CCS and electric vehicles? A very positive assessment is made by the Center for American Progress.

This article reviews the climate performance of different US states and is mainly based on Climate Change 101: state action published by the Pew Centre on Global Climate Change and on State of the States 2008: Renewable Energy Development and the Role of Policy published by the US Department of Energy’s Renewable Energy Laboratory.

I agree that wind and nuclear energy are not intrinsically opposed to each other. However, France only has wind power because it’s forced to by the European Union.

David Walters

The ANC government has connected 80% of all South Africans to the electricity grid – one of its greatest successes. However, this mass electrification programme, combined with strong economic growth and rapid industrialisation, meant that demand for power outstripped supply in early 2008.

Despite the grim economic context, the UK Government managed to find some extra money to help control climate change.