Campaigners question sums behind falling UK emissions

Official figures show a 1.7% decline in greenhouse gas emissions in the UK in 2007 but campaigners accuse government of 'creative accounting'
Juliette Jowit
guardian.co.uk, Tuesday 3 February 2009 15.44 GMT

The annual controversy over whether the UK's greenhouse gas emissions are rising or falling began againtoday with the publication of the latest official figures showing a 1.7% decline in 2007.
The government said the fall in the last full year, for which figures were available, meant the country was on track to reduce emissions by double the target set by the international Kyoto protocol.
However, critics accused the government of "creative accounting" because the calculations ignore the emissions associated with the vast quantity of goods imported to UK consumers and the impact of international aviation and shipping. The calculations also allow the UK to deduct emissions for which it buys credits from other countries.
Based on consumption instead of production, and including all travel, a report by Dieter Helm at Oxford University and two other experts calculated that UK emissions rose by 19% between 1990 and 2003.
"What's important is the UK's impact on global warming and that includes other issues like aviation and consumption," said Stephen Hale, the director of the Green Alliance, a coalition of environmental groups.
The Department for Energy and Climate Change (Decc) said total emissions for six greenhouse gases in 2007 were 636.6m tonnes, down from 647.9m in 2006. This included a reduction in carbon dioxide, the biggest source of greenhouse gas, which measured 542.6m tonnes, down from 551.1m.
Based on these figures, total emissions have fallen by 18.4% and carbon dioxide emissions are down by 8.5% since 1990. There were even greater declines of 21.7% and 12.8% if the impact of carbon trading was taken into account because some emissions were offset by buying allowances generated by reductions in other countries.
These compare with the Kyoto target to cut all greenhouse gases by 12.5% between 1990 and 2008-2012, and Labour's more ambitious pledge at the last three general elections to cut carbon emissions from the 1990 figure by 20% by 2010.
The data for the latest two years has been adjusted for changes in the way the calculations are made, which reduced the totals for 2006 by just above 0.6% from earlier published totals.
The focus on the production of energy and goods, the exclusion of most aviation and shipping, and the inclusion of emissions trading credits, are all in accordance with international rules. But critics say using the official figures disguises how the UK is actually adding to global emissions.
Environmental campaigners are also angry with the government over its recent approval of a major expansion of the UK's biggest airport, Heathrow, and over plans to build new coal-fired power stations with no guarantee that equipment to capture and store the carbon emissions will be fitted.
"There is no way the UK will meet its targets for tackling climate change as long as we are building new coal power stations and more runways," said Benedict Southworth, the director of the World Development Movement, a campaigning charity. "The UK has to vastly increase its efforts to prevent climate change taking away the lives and livelihoods of millions of people."
Ed Miliband, the secretary of state for energy and climate change, said: "It's important that we are making progress towards reducing our greenhouse gas emissions and we are on course to be one of the first countries to do better than our Kyoto commitment. But we need to reduce emissions even more quickly and I believe the policies we are putting in place now will set us on that path to meet the challenging targets we set ourselves in the Climate Change Act."