Political News-New Inquiry Adapting to climate change

Most of the changes in climate that will happen over the next 30 to 40 years have already been determined by past and present emissions of greenhouse gases. This means that changes in our climate are inevitable, even if we can successfully reduce greenhouse gas emissions to avoid dangerous levels of climate change.

The kind of changes we could see include warmer and wetter winters, hotter and drier summers, sea level rise, and more severe weather events such as storms, floods, droughts and heat waves. Adapting to climate change is the process of building resilience and preparing households, businesses, infrastructure, public services and vulnerable parts of our society to cope with the impacts of climate change, and to take advantage of any new opportunities that result.

The Committee has commissioned a review from the National Audit Office (NAO) on climate change adaptation (see http://www.nao.org.uk/what_we_do/support_to_parliament/select_committees.aspx).

This provides an overview of climate change adaptation policy in England, including the implications of the Climate Change Act 2008, the cross-government 'Adapting to Climate Change' programme and the current capacity across Government Departments to assess and manage risks to their objectives from future climate change impacts.

The NAO's review is the starting point for a new inquiry into adaptation that is launched today. The purpose of the inquiry is to assess whether the Government is on the right path to embedding effectively climate change adaptation, and management of risks from future climate change impacts, into Government programmes, policies and decision making, and into those of the wider public and private sectors.

The Committee will also examine whether climate change adaptation is being sufficiently funded and supported as a challenge for the long-term and the extent to which short-term pressures could prevent effective adaptation.

In particular the Committee is interested in receiving written evidence that looks at:

* the extent to which the Adapting to Climate Change Programme will increase resilience by embedding adaptation and climate change risk assessment into the work of Government Departments;

* the extent to which Government departments have identified the risks from a changing climate that will stop them from meeting their objectives;

* the suitability of the processes and structures in and across Government departments for identifying, mitigating and managing these risks and determining the future
priorities of central government's approach to adaptation (and the National Adaptation Programme);

* how well the overall direction for work on adaptation has been set, the effectiveness of the statutory framework (including the use of the Reporting Power and its accompanying statutory guidance),
the allocation of powers and duties and how well issues like social justice are addressed in adaptation policies;

* whether short-term priorities for action including identifying and protecting key infrastructure and systems
(for example power, food, water, transport infrastructure, defence and security), have been identified and how these are or might be addressed;

* the funding, support, training and other resources available, including at a local and regional level, for:

o building capacity to adapt to climate change

o specific actions to adapt to climate change, such as investment in flood risk management or the resilience of critical national infrastructure

o helping individuals and organisations conduct their own climate change risk assessments and judge what actions they need to take;

* the monitoring and evaluation of work on adaptation, including thoughts on how progress on adaptation can be quantified and success measured;

*the effectiveness of communication within and between departments; and between government, local government, business and the general public on adaptation;

* whether work on adaptation should be embedded into existing sustainable development frameworks and, if so, how this might be achieved.

Responses dealing with one or two of the issues above are as welcome as more wide ranging responses. Those responding to this call for evidence are encouraged to look at the work done for the Committee by the NAO

(see http://www.nao.org.uk/what_we_do/support_to_parliament/select_committees.aspx).

The Committee invites organisations and members of the public to submit written evidence setting out their views on these issues. Submissions should be sent to the Committee by Monday 5 October 2009.

For full details and to see the committee website please click here

Industry News- Government launches £1 million electric car infrastructure fund

At present there is very little infrastructure for charging low-carbon vehicles

The Department for Transport has launched a £1 million grant fund to encourage the installation of public infrastructure for low-carbon vehicles, including electric car recharging points.

Announced yesterday (July 22), the Infrastructure Grant Programme (IGP) is set to offer an average 50% grant for the installation of alternative refuelling infrastructure, including electric vehicle recharging, and natural gas, hydrogen and bio-methane refuelling.

The Programme is to be administered by the government's appointed low carbon vehicle delivery agency Cenex, and will run until 2011.

Rosie Snashall, electric vehicles and policy manager for the Department for Transport, said: "As our delivery partner, Cenex will leverage the demand from organisations wishing to install refuelling or recharging stations for vehicles, thus enabling them to bring down the costs of reducing carbon for everyone."

The scheme will offer funding for infrastructure hardware costs, and the cost of labour, civil engineering and ground works for each successful project Grants.Cenex said yesterday that both public and private sector applicants were welcome to apply for the scheme, and that firms of all sizes were eligible for grants.

But, speaking to New Energy Focus it added that: "applicants should also note that value for money is one of the assessment criteria and they are encouraged to maximise investment into the project before applying for a grant."

Robert Evans, chief executive of Cenex, said: "For fleet operators, the cost of installing, refuelling or recharging infrastructure has always been a barrier to switching fuel use. This programme will encourage operators to accelerate the introduction of lower-carbon technologies into the UK vehicle market, thereby helping cut the UK's total carbon emissions."

This programme follows on from a previous 30% grant scheme run by the Energy Savings Trust, that was set up to encourage the development of a nationwide network of public fuelling stations.Formed in 2005 and based at Loughborough University, Cenex is supported by the Department of Business, Innovation and Skills (BIS) and aims to promote and stimulate the market for low carbon and fuel-cell technologies.

The organisation will run three Infrastructure Grant Programme information days over the next two months, in Edinburgh, Birmingham and Port Talbot in Wales.

Industry News-Not under our backyard, say Germans, in blow to CO2 plans

German carbon capture plan appears to be a victim of 'numbyism' - not under my backyard

It was meant to be the world's first demonstration of a technology that could help save the planet from global warming – a project intended to capture emissions from a coal-fired power station and bury them safely underground.

But the German carbon capture plan has ended with CO2 being pumped directly into the atmosphere, following local opposition at it being stored underground.The scheme appears a victim of "numbyism" – not under my backyard.

Opposition to the carbon capture plan has contributed to a growing public backlash against renewable energy projects, raising fears that Europe will struggle to meet its low-carbon commitments. Last week, the Danish firm Vestas blamed British "nimbies" opposing wind farms for its decision to close its turbine factory on the Isle of Wight.

Many countries continue to use coal for generating power as it is the cheapest and most readily available fuel in the world. It will probably power the development of China and India. But coal is also seen as the dirtiest fuel. So, Vattenfall's Schwarze Pumpe project in Spremberg, northern Germany, launched in a blaze of publicity last September, was a beacon of hope, the first scheme to link the three key stages of trapping, transporting and burying the greenhouse gases.

The Swedish company, however, surprised a recent conference when it admitted that the €70m (£60.3m) project was venting the CO2 straight into the atmosphere. "It was supposed to begin injecting by March or April of this year but we don't have a permit. This is a result of the local public having questions about the safety of the project," said Staffan Gortz, head of carbon capture and storage communication at Vattenfall. He said he did not expect to get a permit before next spring: "People are very, very sceptical."

The spread of localised resistance is a force that some fear could sink Europe's attempts to build 10 to 12 demonstration projects for carbon capture and storage (CCS) by 2015. The plan had been to transport up to 100,000 tonnes of carbon dioxide from the power plant each year and inject it into depleted gas reservoirs at a giant gasfield near the Polish border.

Scientists maintain that public safety fears are groundless: the consequences of escaping CO2 would be to the climate, not to public health. Many big environmental groups support CCS, both off and onshore, as a necessary evil in the battle against climate change.

But Jim Footner, a Greenpeace climate campaigner, said the German protests were "a stark warning to those that think CCS is an easy solution to the huge climate problems of coal-fired power stations".

The first wake-up call came in March, when a Dutch council objected to Shell's plans to store CO2 in depleted gas fields under the town of Barendrecht, near Rotterdam.

This was despite a successful environmental impact assessment and the enthusiastic backing of the Dutch government, which, in September, must decide whether to give Shell the green light, despite the council's opposition.

Wim van de Wiel, a Shell spokesman, said: "For Shell the only suitable location for the tender was, and still is, Barendrecht, because of the safety and the depleted status of the [gas] field."

Jeff Chapman, chief executive of the the Carbon Capture & Storage Association, said Vattenfall should study the example of Total, which made great efforts to engage the local community when it launched its CCS pilot project in Lacq, southern France.

Stuart Haszeldine, a CCS expert at the University of Edinburgh, warned of the danger of opposition towards CCS snowballing into a "bandwagon of negativity" if too many early projects were rejected. "Once you've screwed up one or two of them, people are going to think 'if they rejected this in Barendrecht, there must be a reason'," he said.

In the UK, CCS is one of the four "pillars" of the government's decarbonisation strategy. A spokeswoman for the Department of Energy and Climate Change said: "We plan to store the CO2 from CCS plants offshore, for example in depleted oil and gas fields in the North Sea. We are one of the first countries to have legislation … to regulate environmental and safety risks."

Political News - Lord Adonis Minister for Transport article in the Guardian

The road ahead is Green

Lord Andrew Adonis – Minister for Transport

Transport, my ministerial brief, must play a major role in a low-carbon future. And I am determined we'll get there.

There are issues that shape every generation and define every age. Climate change is just such an issue and our political generation has got to deal with it.

The scientific consensus tells us that by 2050 we must reduce global greenhouse gas emissions by 50%. But, as a developed country, we have a responsibility to go even further. So we passed the landmark Climate Change Act and set ourselves a binding target to reduce the UK's greenhouse gas emissions by at least 80% by 2050.

With transport accounting for 21% of total UK domestic emissions, de-carbonising this sector has to be front and centre of efforts to meet our obligations and commitments. Which is precisely why we are launching our new strategy today: "Low carbon transport: a greener future".

This is a key component of the government's wider plans to cut carbon. It sets out our long-term vision for a fundamentally different transport system in our country, contributing substantially to the CO2 savings needed to meet the economy-wide carbon budgets. Our vision is underpinned by the concept of choice – making low-carbon travel a genuine and viable option for people and businesses, within and between different modes of transport. And it's inspired, in Anthony Giddens's words, by "a mixture of the idealistic and the hard-headed".

Real progress is already being made. The New Car CO2 Regulation, which we agreed with our European partners last December, is expected to save 7m tonnes of CO2 in the UK in 2020. We also have a huge opportunity to create a flourishing market for ultra-low emission vehicles in the UK. We have moved firmly into this space, to get new, greener technology on our roads. We have established a £250m fund for consumer incentives and electric vehicle charging infrastructure, to encourage take-up and support the technology as it comes to market. We have also launched a £30m scheme to encourage uptake of low-emission buses, which will stimulate the market as well as helping to safeguard jobs in bus manufacturing.

Last month, we announced the results of two technology competitions. The first, a £25m programme run by the Technology Strategy Board, will see more than 340 ultra-low emission cars tested out in cities around the UK. In the second, public-sector fleets will trial up to 150 low-emission and all-electric vans.

But technology isn't the whole answer. We also need to think about how and when we travel. There is an important role for the regions and local authorities here. We are giving large urban areas across England the chance to bid to become the country's first sustainable travel city. This will be used to encourage greener and more active travel modes – walking and cycling, as well as improving public transport.

There is an exciting agenda on the railways with transformational projects like the Crossrail scheme, which will bring an additional 1.5 million people within 60-minutes' commuting distance of London's key business districts. We have completed the country's first high-speed rail line, High Speed One, and we are preparing the way for a north-south high-speed line with the establishment of the High Speed Two Company. We have been examining in detail the case for more rail electrification and plan to make announcements soon.

Another important point – close to my heart – is improving the integration of services. That is why I have pledged £5m to improve radically cycle facilities at our railway stations.

In aviation, we have set ourselves a tough national target to bring CO2 emissions from UK aviation below 2005 levels by 2050. We will achieve this first by the use of market-based measures, including an effective emissions trading scheme. And Ed Miliband and I will be pressing for international aviation, as well as international shipping, to be included in any new global deal agreed at the Copenhagen climate change conference in December.

The goals we have set ourselves are certainly ambitious. But, thanks to a track record of progress and achievement, we have before us a real opportunity to build a greener, cleaner future for our transport system, our country and the environment we all share. It is an opportunity I am determined to seize.

Click here for the full guardian article

Political News-Speculation grows around Miliband energy plans

Green Jobs, Bill Increases, Speed and Clarity are the order of the day

Speculation is growing around the details of Ed Milliband's, renewable energy package which is due to be announced on Wednesday. This will be the third time in five years that the government will attempt to make clear their proposals on cutting green house emissions and their ideas for energy generation in the UK.

The UK government is committed to cutting carbon emissions by 34 per cent by 2020. The UK is also bound by the European Union to produce 15 per cent of the country’s energy needs from renewables by the same year.

The question is how the government intend to fund the estimated £100 billion needed for development of the renewable sector and the upgrade of the national grid to a ‘smart grid’. The fear among politicians is that the costs will and can only be met by an increase in energy bills for the voter.

An increase in bills in economic tight times will do nothing but increase voters ire and is a dangerous move in an election year. Ed Miliband and his advisers will be very aware that discussing bill increases of a pound or two are fine and may go somewhat unnoticed at the end of a heatwave in the summer months. However the political repercussions will be felt in the winter months when demand for energy increases and the prices start to spike again. But if it is not the consumer that will shoulder the burden of the government meeting its renewables target then who will?

The private sector has already claimed that there is not enough available money or investment in bringing new technologies such as marine, biomass and wind to the energy mix at the speed at which is required. Investing in the smart grid, transmission points and further storage all come with a high cost which over time will dwarf the money that was pumped into the banking crisis.

Dieter Helm, an energy expert at New College Oxford was quoted in the Financial Times as saying “the enormous investment needed in renewables would have been hard to finance even when financial markets were strong, and would be even more difficult following the credit crunch” The return to investors would need to come from the public through higher energy bills.

This echoes the opinion outlined early this week by David Milborrow in his paper Managing Variability where he claims that “The UK can meet its targets of generating more than a third of its electricity from wind by 2020 without raising the risk of blackouts at an additional cost of £2 for every £100 electricity bill”.

The uncertainty over returns on investment in wind and solar power has already seen some large energy groups such as BP and Royal Dutch Shell from pulling back from the renewable sector. The government’s former chief scientific adviser, Sir David King, sites this hesitancy by the private sector to invest is a result of the government’s failure to come up with a plan and stick to it.

In the Sunday Times he is quoted as saying “you can’t keep adjusting the energy policy, businesses need a clear signal that any investments they make now in low carbon technology and infrastructure in the UK will pay off in the future”.

On the positive side Miliband is expected to announce the creation of up to 400,000 green collar jobs. These jobs are expected to focus across the renewable sector of wind, solar, marine and biomass. But there will be funding for the nuclear sector also.

Whatever, the finer details of this weeks’ announcement Miliband must make speed and clarity as being the essence for the growth of the sector and creation of green jobs. Earlier this week Dr. Keith Maclean, Head of Policy and Public Affairs, Scottish & Southern Energy in the APPCCG Westminster Debate noted that “the uncertainty that there is around small projects because of issues in relation to transmission charges.

Smaller developers need to be able to show the bank that they can make a return on their investment and for this to be done DECC will need to use their powers under the energy act very quickly to make this happen”. His fear is that unless action is taken in this area soon there will “be no investment for more small to medium generators going into the market”.

If the government are to find a solution to the two challenges of climate change and creating new jobs the time is to act now.

Industry Renewables Report-Managing Variability by David Milborrow

One week ahead of when the UK government is expected to publish its ‘Renewable Energy Strategy’, a new report Managing Variability, by energy analyst David Milborrow, claims that the UK’s grid could cope with the variable energy input generated from wind farms.

The report commissioned by WWF, RSPB, Greenpeace and Friends of the Earth looks at the options already available to manage variability on the system, identifies solutions for the future and assesses ways to minimise costs.


Summary of Findings:
•Wind Power can significantly reduce our climate damaging emissions.

•Fluctuations in wind strength can be managed technically and at modest and declining cost.

•High proportions of wind power in our energy mix are feasible, and are already successfully integrated in other countries.

•A range of technological developments already underway could allow for a steadily increasing use of wind power and the phasing out of conventional carbon based fuels as backup technology.

Conclusions:
•There is no technical barrier to accommodating large amounts of wind power in our energy mix. We can keep the lights on.

•Even at relatively high levels of wind in the energy mix, the need for backup capacity is modest, with most backup needs being met by the existing pool which supports all forms of power generation.

•The cost associated with managing the variable nature of wind power are modest and can be expected to decline as new technologies including a supergrid, smart grid and improved energy storage are developed.

•As other variable renewable technologies are developed, it is expected that these too would be suited to displace conventional power stations.

•Other European countries are already using large proportions of wind power in their energy mix and see no technical barriers to increasing to higher levels.


Recommendations:
•Ensure that the energy market is able to deliver a massive expansion of renewables. This must include ensuring that the energy regulators main task is to cut climate change emissions by prioritising renewables and energy efficiency.

•Grant priority access to the energy market and electricity grid system for renewables ahead of conventional dirty power.

•Deploy continued and substantially increased financial support and regulatory incentives for renewable energy beyond 2020.

•Secure attractive grants and green loans for energy efficiency measures and research and development for renewable technologies.

•Enable better planning for renewabels, including spatially based approaches to ensure timely delivery and facilitate appropriate siting.

•Create an industrial strategy that will establish skills and manufacturing in the UK, addressing shortages in the supply chain for renewables and boosting jobs and the economy.

Click here for the full report Managing Variability by David Milborrow