Steven Levitt and Stephen Dubner, authors of the bestselling Freakonomics, are back to challenge more accepted views. This time they claim that CO2 may be good, trees are harmful and a giant hosepipe in space could save the planet
In a nondescript suburb of Seattle there’s a charmless and windowless building that used to be a Harley-Davidson repair shop. A sheet of paper taped to the door reads “Intellectual Ventures”. Inside is one of the most unusual laboratories in the world. There are lathes and mould makers and 3-D printers, many powerful computers and a fish tank for zapping malarial mosquitoes with lasers.
Intellectual Ventures (IV) is an invention company. Scientists and puzzle solvers of every variety dream up processes and products and file patent applications, more than 500 a year.
Nathan Myhrvold — a polymath who as a young man did quantum cosmology research at Cambridge with Stephen Hawking — co-founded IV nine years ago. Myhrvold, now 50, recalls watching Doctor Who when he was young: “The Doctor introduces himself to someone who says, ‘Doctor? Are you some kind of scientist?’ And he says, ‘Sir, I am every kind of scientist’. And I was, like, yes! Yes! That is what I want to be: every kind of scientist!”
He did so by playing a variety of roles at Microsoft: futurist, strategist, founder of its research lab and whisperer-in-chief to Bill Gates. “I don’t know anyone I would say is smarter than Nathan,” Gates, an investor in IV, once observed.
In 1999, when he left Microsoft, Myhrvold appeared on the Forbes list of the 400 richest Americans. At the same time he is famously penny-pinching. As he walks through the IV lab pointing out his favourite gadgets, his greatest pride is reserved for items he bought on eBay or at bankruptcy sales. He is a firm believer that solutions should be cheap and simple whenever possible.
His small group of scientists and engineers has sent satellites to the moon, helped defend the United States against missile attack and, via computing advances, changed the way the world works. They have also conducted definitive research in many fields, including climate science. So it was only a matter of time before they began thinking about climate change.
On the day we visit IV, Myhrvold convenes roughly a dozen of his colleagues to talk about possible solutions to global warming. They sit around a long oval conference table, Myhrvold near one end. And more than 10 hours later we emerge having heard the most extraordinary but convincing proposal.
Everyone in the room agrees that the Earth has been getting warmer and human activity probably has something to do with it. But they also agree that the standard global warming rhetoric is oversimplified and exaggerated.
Too many accounts, Myhrvold says, suffer from “people who get on their high horse and say that our species will be exterminated”.
When Al Gore’s film, An Inconvenient Truth, is mentioned, the table erupts in a sea of groans. The film’s purpose, Myhrvold believes, was “to scare the crap out of people”. Although Gore “isn’t technically lying”, he says, some of the nightmare scenarios Gore describes — the state of Florida disappearing under rising seas, for instance — “don’t have any basis in physical reality in any reasonable time frame. No climate model shows them happening”.
But the scientific community is also at fault. The current climate prediction models are, as Lowell Wood puts it, “enormously crude”. Wood is a heavy-set and spectacularly talkative astrophysicist in his sixties who long ago was Myhrvold’s academic mentor. (Wood himself was a protégé of the physicist Edward Teller.) Myhrvold thinks Wood is one of the smartest men in the universe.
Off the top of his head, Wood seems to know quite a bit about practically anything: the melt rate of the Greenland ice core (80 cubic kilometres per year); the percentage of unsanctioned Chinese power plants that went online in the previous year (about 20%); the number of times that metastatic cancer cells travel through the bloodstream before they land (“as many as a million”).
Wood has achieved a great deal in science on behalf of universities, private firms and the US government. He worked on the “Star Wars” missile defence system. Today he is wearing a rainbow tie-dyed short-sleeved shirt with a matching tie.
“The climate models are crude in space and they’re crude in time,” he continues. “So there’s an enormous amount of natural phenomena they can’t model. They can’t do even giant storms like hurricanes.”
There are several reasons for this, Myhrvold explains. Today’s models use a grid of cells to map the Earth and those grids are too large to allow for the modelling of actual weather. Smaller and more accurate grids would require better modelling software, which would require more computing power.
“We’re trying to predict climate change 20 to 30 years from now,” he says, “but it will take us almost the same amount of time for the computer industry to give us fast enough computers to do the job.”
Most current climate models tend to produce similar predictions. This might lead one to conclude that climate scientists have a pretty good handle on the future. Not so, says Wood.
“Everybody turns their knobs” — that is, adjusts the control parameters and coefficients of their models — “so they aren’t the outlier, because the outlying model is going to have difficulty getting funded.”
In other words, the economic reality of research funding, rather than a disinterested and uncoordinated scientific consensus, leads the models to approximately match one another.
As Wood, Myhrvold and the other scientists discuss the various conventional wisdoms surrounding global warming, few, if any, survive unscathed.
The emphasis on carbon dioxide? “Misplaced,” says Wood. Why? “Because carbon dioxide is not the major greenhouse gas. The major greenhouse gas is water vapour.” Current climate models “do not know how to handle water vapour and various types of clouds. That is the elephant in the corner of this room. I hope we’ll have good numbers on water vapour by 2020 or thereabouts”.
Myhrvold cites a recent paper asserting that carbon dioxide may have had little to do with recent warming. Instead, all the heavy particulate pollution we generated in earlier decades seems to have cooled the atmosphere by dimming the sun. That sparked a brief panic over global cooling in the 1970s. The trend began to reverse when we started cleaning up our air.
“So most of the warming seen over the past few decades,” Myhrvold says, “might actually be due to good environmental stewardship.”
Not so many years ago schoolchildren were taught that carbon dioxide is the naturally occurring lifeblood of plants. Today children are more likely to think of carbon dioxide as a poison. That’s because the amount in the atmosphere has increased substantially over the past century from about 280 parts per million to 380.
What people don’t know, the IV scientists say, is that the carbon dioxide level 80m years ago — when our mammalian ancestors were evolving — was at least 1,000 parts per million. That same concentration, in fact, is the regulation standard inside new energy-efficient office buildings.
So not only is carbon dioxide plainly not poisonous, but changes in carbon dioxide levels don’t necessarily mirror human activity. Nor does atmospheric carbon dioxide necessarily warm the Earth: ice-cap evidence shows that over the past several hundred thousand years, carbon dioxide levels have risen after a rise in temperature, not the other way around.
Beside Myhrvold sits Ken Caldeira, a soft-spoken man with a boyish face and a halo of curly hair. He runs an ecology lab at Stanford University for the Carnegie Institution. Caldeira is among the most respected climate scientists in the world, his research cited approvingly by the most fervent environmentalists. He contributes research to the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, which shared the 2007 Nobel peace prize with Al Gore for sounding the alarm on global warming. (Yes, Caldeira got a Nobel certificate.) If you met Caldeira at a party, you would likely place him in the fervent environmentalist camp himself. He remains thoroughly convinced that human activity is responsible for some global warming and is more pessimistic than Myhrvold about how future climate will affect humankind.
Yet his research tells him that carbon dioxide is not the right villain in this fight. For starters, as greenhouse gases go it’s not particularly efficient.
“A doubling of carbon dioxide traps less than 2% of the outgoing radiation emitted by the Earth,” he says.
Caldeira mentions a study he undertook that considered the impact of higher carbon dioxide levels on plant life. While plants get their water from the soil, they get their food — carbon dioxide — from the air.
“Plants pay exceedingly dearly for carbon dioxide,” Wood jumps in. “A plant has to raise about a hundred times as much water from the soil as it gets carbon dioxide from the air, on a molecule-lost-per-molecule-gained basis. Most plants, especially during the active part of the growing season, are water-stressed. They bleed very seriously to get their food.”
So an increase in carbon dioxide means plants require less water to grow. Caldeira’s study showed that doubling the amount of carbon dioxide while holding steady all other inputs — water, nutrients and so forth — yields a 70% increase in plant growth, an obvious boon to agricultural productivity.
“That’s why most commercial hydroponic greenhouses have supplemental carbon dioxide,” Myhrvold says. “And they typically run at 1,400 parts per million.”
“Twenty thousand years ago,” Caldeira says, “carbon dioxide levels were lower, sea level was lower — and trees were in a near state of asphyxiation for lack of carbon dioxide. There’s nothing special about today’s carbon dioxide level, or today’s sea level, or today’s temperature. What damages us are rapid rates of change. Overall, more carbon dioxide is probably a good thing for the biosphere — it’s just that it’s increasing too fast.”
The gentlemen of IV abound with further examples of global warming memes (ideas that replicate across society) that are all wrong.
Rising sea levels, for instance, “aren’t being driven primarily by glaciers melting”, Wood says, no matter how useful that image may be for environmental activists. The truth is far less sexy: “It is driven mostly by water warming — literally, the thermal expansion of ocean water as it warms up.”
Sea levels have been rising, Wood says, for roughly 12,000 years since the end of the last ice age. The oceans are about 425ft higher today, but the bulk of that rise occurred in the first thousand years. In the past century the seas have risen less than 8in.
Rather than the catastrophic 30ft rise some people have predicted over the next century, Wood notes that the most authoritative literature on the subject suggests a rise of about 1½ft by 2100. That’s much less than the twice-daily tidal variation in most coastal locations.
“So it’s a little bit difficult,” he says, “to understand what the purported crisis is about.”
Caldeira, with something of a pained look on his face, mentions a most surprising environmental scourge: trees. Yes, trees. As much as Caldeira personally lives the green life — his Stanford office is cooled by a misting water chamber rather than air-conditioning — his research has found that planting trees in certain locations exacerbates warming because dark leaves absorb more incoming sunlight than, say, grassy plains, sandy deserts or snow-covered expanses.
Then there is this little-discussed fact about global warming: while the drumbeat of doom has grown louder over the past several years, the average global temperature has in fact decreased.
In the darkened conference room, Myhrvold cues up an overhead slide that summarises IV’s views of current proposed global warming solutions. The slide says:
• Too little Too late Too optimistic
Too little means that typical conservation efforts simply won’t make much of a difference. “If you believe there’s a problem worth solving,” Myhrvold says, “then these solutions won’t be enough to solve it. Wind power and most other alternative energy things are cute, but they don’t scale to a sufficient degree. At this point wind farms are a government subsidy scheme, fundamentally.”
What about the beloved Toyota Prius and other low-emission vehicles? “They’re great,” he says, “except that transportation is just not that big a sector.”
Also, coal is so cheap that trying to generate electricity without it would be economic suicide, especially for developing countries.
Myhrvold argues that cap-and-trade agreements, whereby coal emissions are limited by quota and cost, can’t help much, in part because it is already . . .
Too late. The half-life of atmospheric carbon dioxide is roughly 100 years and some of it remains in the atmosphere for thousands of years. So even if humankind immediately stopped burning all fossil fuel, the existing carbon dioxide would remain in the atmosphere for several generations.
And by the way, that zero-carbon society you were dreamily thinking about is way . . .
Too optimistic. “A lot of the things that people say would be a good thing probably aren’t,” Myhrvold says.
As an example he points to solar power. “The problem with solar cells is that they’re black, because they are designed to absorb light from the sun. But only about 12% gets turned into electricity and the rest is re-radiated as heat — which contributes to global warming.”
The energy consumed in building thousands of new solar cell factories would also create a huge long-term “warming debt”.
“Eventually we’d have a great carbon-free energy infrastructure but only after making emissions and global warming worse every year until we’re done building out the solar plants, which could take 30 to 50 years,” says Myhrvold.
But what happens if the doomsayers turn out to be right? What if the Earth is becoming dangerously warmer, whether because of our fossil fuel profligacy or some natural climate cycle? We don’t really want to sit back and stew in our own juices, do we?
Myhrvold, Wood and Caldeira have developed a cunning plan.
Even as a kid, Myhrvold was fascinated by geophysical phenomena — volcanoes, sunspots and the like — and their history of affecting the climate. In 1815, the gargantuan eruption of Mt Tambora in Indonesia produced “the year without a summer”, a worldwide disaster that killed crops and prompted widespread starvation and food riots. As Myhrvold puts it: “All really big ass volcanoes have some climate effects.”
The typical volcano sends sulphur dioxide into the troposphere, the atmospheric layer closest to the Earth’s surface. This is similar to what a coal-burning power plant does with its sulphur emissions. In both cases the gas stays in the sky only a week or so before falling back to the ground as acid rain.
But a “big ass” volcano shoots sulphur dioxide far higher into the stratosphere. That’s the layer that begins at about seven miles above the Earth’s surface, or six miles at the poles. Above that threshold altitude, the sulphur dioxide absorbs stratospheric water vapour and forms an aerosol cloud that circulates rapidly, blanketing most of the globe.
That’s what happened in 1991 when Mt Pinatubo erupted in the Philippines. It put more sulphur dioxide into the stratosphere than any volcano since Krakatoa, more than a century earlier. The atmospheric after-effects were undeniable: a decrease in ozone, more diffuse sunlight and a sustained drop in global temperature.
Myhrvold, then working at Microsoft, followed the scientific literature on the Pinatubo climate effects. One year later he read the 900-page report from the US National Academy of Sciences (NAS) called Policy Implications of Greenhouse Warming. This included a chapter on geoengineering, which the NAS defined as “large-scale engineering of our environment in order to combat or counteract the effects of changes in atmospheric chemistry”. In other words: if human activity is warming up the planet, could human ingenuity cool it down?
The NAS report raised the possibility of intentionally spreading sulphur dioxide in the stratosphere. After Pinatubo there was no doubt that stratospheric sulphur dioxide cooled the Earth. But wouldn’t it be nice not to have to rely on volcanoes to do the job?
Unfortunately, the proposals for getting sulphur dioxide into the stratosphere were complex, costly and impractical. Loading up artillery shells, for instance, and firing them into the sky.
Or launching a fleet of fighter jets with high-sulphur fuel and letting their exhaust paint the stratosphere.
“It was more science fiction than science,” says Myhrvold. “None of the plans made any economic or practical sense.”
Many scientists, particularly nature-friendly ones such as Caldeira, found the idea abhorrent. Dump chemicals in the atmosphere to reverse the damage caused by . . . dumping chemicals in the atmosphere? It was a crazy, hair-of-the-dog scheme that seemed to violate every tenet of environmentalism.
After hearing Wood give a lecture on stratospheric sulphur dioxide, Caldeira also thought it simply wouldn’t work. However, being a scientist who prefers data to dogma he ran a climate model to test Wood’s claims.
“The intent,” he says, “was to put an end to all the geoengineering talk.”
He failed. As much as Caldeira disliked the concept, his model backed up Wood’s claims that geoengineering could stabilise the climate even in the face of a large spike in atmospheric carbon dioxide — and he wrote a paper saying so. Caldeira, the most reluctant geoengineer imaginable, became a convert — willing, at least, to explore the idea.
Which is how it comes to pass that Caldeira, Wood and Myhrvold are huddled together in the former Harley-Davidson repair shop showing off their scheme to stop global warming.
IT wasn’t just the cooling potential of stratospheric sulphur dioxide that surprised Caldeira. It was how little was needed to do the job: about 34 gallons per minute, not much more than the amount of water that comes out of a heavy-duty garden hose.
Warming is largely a polar phenomenon, which means that high latitude areas are four times more sensitive to climate change than the equator. By IV’s estimations, 100,000 tons of sulphur dioxide per year would effectively reverse warming in the high Arctic and reduce it in much of the northern hemisphere.
That may sound like a lot but, relatively speaking, it is a smidgeon. At least 200m tons of sulphur dioxide already go into the atmosphere each year, roughly 25% from human sources such as motor vehicles and coal-fired power plants, 25% from volcanoes and the rest from other natural sources such as sea spray.
So all that would be needed to produce a globe-changing effect is one-twentieth of 1% of current sulphur emissions, simply relocated to a higher point in the sky. How?
Once you eliminate the moralism and the angst, the task of reversing global warming boils down to a straightforward engineering problem: how to get 34 gallons per minute of sulphur dioxide into the stratosphere. The answer: a garden hose to the sky.
For anyone who loves cheap and simple solutions, things don’t get much better. Here’s how it would work. At a base station sulphur would be burnt into sulphur dioxide and then liquefied. The hose, stretching from the base station into the stratosphere, would be about 18 miles long but extremely light, its diameter just a couple of inches.
It would be suspended from a series of high-strength helium-filled balloons fastened to it at 100 to 300-yard intervals (a “string of pearls”, IV calls it), ranging in diameter from 25ft near the ground to 100ft near the top.
The liquefied sulphur dioxide would be sent skyward by a series of pumps, fixed to the hose every 100 yards. These, too, would be relatively light, about 45lb each — “smaller than the pumps in my swimming pool”, Myhrvold says.
There are several advantages to using many small pumps rather than one monster pump at the base station: a big ground pump would create more pressure, which would require a far heavier hose; even if a few of the small pumps failed, the mission itself wouldn’t; and using small standardised units would keep costs down.
At the end of the hose, a cluster of nozzles would spritz the stratosphere with a fine mist of colourless liquid sulphur dioxide. Thanks to stratospheric winds that typically reach 100mph, the spritz would wrap around the Earth in roughly 10 days.
Because stratospheric air naturally spirals toward the poles, and because the Arctic regions are more vulnerable to global warming, it makes sense to spray the sulphur aerosol at high latitude — with perhaps one hose in the southern hemisphere and another in the northern.
Myhrvold, in his recent travels, happened upon one potentially perfect site. Along with Gates and Warren Buffett, the American investor, he was taking a whirlwind educational tour of various energy producers — a nuclear plant, a wind farm and so on.
One of their destinations was the Athabasca oil sands in northern Alberta, Canada. Billions of barrels of petroleum can be found there, but it is heavy, mucky crude mixed in with the surface dirt. You scoop up gigantic shovels of earth and then separate the oil from it.
One of the most plentiful waste components is sulphur, which commands such a low price that oil companies simply stockpile it. “There were big yellow mountains of it, like a hundred metres high by a thousand metres wide,” says Myhrvold. “So you could put one little pumping facility up there and with one corner of one of those sulphur mountains you could solve the whole global warming problem for the northern hemisphere.”
It is a fiendishly simple plan and startlingly cheap. IV estimates a “save the poles” project could be set up in just two years at a cost of roughly $20m, with an annual operating cost of about $10m.
If cooling the poles alone proved insufficient, IV has drawn up a “save the planet” version, with five worldwide base stations instead of two and three hoses at each site. This would put about three to five times the amount of sulphur dioxide into the stratosphere. Even so, that would still represent less than 1% of current worldwide sulphur emissions.
IV estimates this plan could be up and running in about three years, with a start-up cost of $150m and annual operating costs of $100m. It could effectively reverse global warming at a total cost of $250m.
Nicholas Stern, the economist who prepared an encyclopedic report on global warming for the British government, suggested we spend 1.5% of global GDP each year — that would be a $1.2 trillion bill today — to attack the problem.
By comparison, IV’s idea is practically free. It would cost $50m less to stop global warming than Gore’s foundation is paying just to increase public awareness about global warming.
Would it work? The scientific evidence says yes. Perhaps the stoutest scientific argument in favour of it came from Paul Crutzen, a Dutch atmospheric scientist whose environmentalist bona fides run even deeper than Caldeira’s — he won a Nobel prize for his research on atmospheric ozone depletion.
In 2006 he wrote an essay in the journal Climatic Change lamenting the “grossly unsuccessful” efforts to emit fewer greenhouse gases and acknowledging that an injection of sulphur in the stratosphere “is the only option available to rapidly reduce temperature rises and counteract other climatic effects”.
Crutzen’s embrace of geoengineering was considered such a heresy within the climate science community that some of his peers tried to stop the publication of his essay. How could the man reverently known as “Dr Ozone” possibly endorse such a scheme? Wouldn’t the environmental damage outweigh the benefits?
Actually, no. Crutzen concluded that damage to the ozone would be minimal. The sulphur dioxide would eventually settle out in the polar regions but in such relatively small amounts that significant harm was unlikely.
Perhaps the single best objection to the garden hose idea is that it is too simple and too cheap. There is no regulatory framework to prohibit anyone — a government, a private institution, even an individual — from putting sulphur dioxide in the atmosphere. Still, Myhrvold admits that “it would freak people out” if someone unilaterally built the thing.
Of course, this depends on the individual. If it were Gore, he might snag a second Nobel prize.
Myhrvold is not arguing for an immediate deployment of the sulphur shield but, rather, that technologies like it be researched and tested so they are ready to use if the worst climate predictions come true. He is also eager to get geoengineering moving forward because of what he sees as “a real head of steam” that global warming activists have gathered in recent years.
“They are seriously proposing doing a set of things that could have enormous impact — and we think probably negative impact — on human life,” he says. “They want to divert a huge amount of economic value toward immediate and precipitous anti-carbon initiatives, without thinking things through.
“This will have a huge drag on the world economy. There are billions of poor people who will be greatly delayed, if not entirely precluded, from attaining a First World standard of living.”
Certain new ideas, no matter how useful, are invariably seen as repugnant. The hosepipe may simply be too repugnant a scheme ever to be given a chance. Intentional pollution? Futzing with the stratosphere? Putting the planet’s weather in the hands of a few arrogant souls from Seattle?
It is one thing for climate heavyweights such as Crutzen and Caldeira to endorse such a solution. But they are mere scientists. The real heavyweights in this fight are people like Gore.
And what does he think of geoengineering?
“In a word,” Gore says, “I think it’s nuts.”
© Steven D Levitt and Stephen J Dubner 2009 Extracted from Superfreakonomics: Global Cooling, Patriotic Prostitutes and Why Suicide Bombers Should Buy Life Insurance by Steven D Levitt and Stephen J Dubner, to be published by Allen Lane on October 20 at £20. Copies can be ordered for £18, including postage, from The Sunday Times BooksFirst on 0845 271 2135
Sunday, 18 October 2009
General Electric looks to build £200m wind farm plant in UK
The American engineering giant General Electric (GE) is looking to site a £200m industrial plant to build wind turbines in Britain.
By Kamal AhmedPublished: 7:41PM BST 17 Oct 2009
A GE briefing note seen by The Sunday Telegraph says that the firm is now looking for "targeted financial support for the development" and is in discussions with the Department of Business, Innovations and Skills and the Department for Energy and Climate Change. It is also considering sites in Germany and Scandinavia, and will make a decision on where to build the new plant by the end of the year.
GE officials have also met Greg Barker, shadow climate change minister, who has assured the firm that any future Tory government would be committed to offshore marine technology, which could be a £20bn market by 2020.
"GE is now developing its growth plan for the new offshore wind business, which will include a new global centre of excellence for offshore wind turbine technology that would be sited in Europe," the briefing says. It adds that the complex would "generate new engineering jobs".
By Kamal AhmedPublished: 7:41PM BST 17 Oct 2009
A GE briefing note seen by The Sunday Telegraph says that the firm is now looking for "targeted financial support for the development" and is in discussions with the Department of Business, Innovations and Skills and the Department for Energy and Climate Change. It is also considering sites in Germany and Scandinavia, and will make a decision on where to build the new plant by the end of the year.
GE officials have also met Greg Barker, shadow climate change minister, who has assured the firm that any future Tory government would be committed to offshore marine technology, which could be a £20bn market by 2020.
"GE is now developing its growth plan for the new offshore wind business, which will include a new global centre of excellence for offshore wind turbine technology that would be sited in Europe," the briefing says. It adds that the complex would "generate new engineering jobs".
Sunday Times Green List: Bank the green dividend
Success in the 2010 Sunday Times Green List will come if bosses and staff work as a team
Zoe Thomas
For the bosses of Britain’s companies, the ticket to green credibility comes only if the staff are included on the journey.
That is the conclusion from two years of The Sunday Times Green List, the benchmark against which businesses can test their green credentials. Organisations can register for the 2010 contest from today.
The contest not only measures efforts to cut the corporate carbon footprint, it also seeks employees’ views on how green their company is.
The top 60 green companies of 2009 ranged from blue-chip multinationals such as BT and Tesco to construction companies with a high environmental impact, including Willmott Dixon, Carillion and Skanska — and not to forget small marketing businesses such as the current champion, Forster, with only 51 staff.
They may differ in size and environmental impact, but what they share is a genuine commitment to putting green issues high up the agenda. They have the strategies and staff input to make it happen.
Our methodology allows companies to compete on a level playing field. Our top 20 this year featured eight companies with fewer than 250 employees, six mid-sized organisations and six with more than 5,000 staff. Eight had an environmental impact classified as low, six were medium and six high.
Will Ullstein, director of innovation at Munro Global, a market-research group and a partner in compiling the Green List, expects competition for a place on the 2010 list to be heated. “Organisations are increasingly understanding and reaping the benefits of running green operations. Media attention is propelling environmental issues up the agenda, and the countdown to the Copenhagen climate-change conference will only focus attention further,” he said.
With the benefit of two years’ data, companies can see the key trends that lead to success on the Green List. Genuine leadership on all things green is vital, as is getting the message across to the workforce.
Of the 52 questions on this year’s employee questionnaire, 13 test employees’ feelings about their bosses’ green credentials. Employees rate from “strongly agree” to “strongly disagree” their response to statements such as:
- My boss is open to suggestions for environmental improvements;
- My boss encourages me to recycle at work;
- My boss expects me to save the environment while he/she drives a gas-guzzling company car.
For companies, there is a close relationship between achieving high scores on the My Boss questions and doing well in the employee survey overall.
Sarah Davidson, technical director at Bureau Veritas, the environmental consultancy and our other partner in producing the Green List, said leadership is the place where the employer and staff surveys meet.
“This is where we get the connection between the employer and the employee responses,” said Davidson. “Leading by example in senior management is the key to linking the corporate programmes with the performance of the general workforce in the employee survey.”
Rick Willmott, chief executive of Willmott Dixon, the construction company that finished third in 2009, knows he has to lead from the front. “You have to set the agenda. You have to nail your colours to the mast,” he said.
Even though the building trade has by its nature a high environmental impact, Willmott thinks entrants should not be deterred.
“If we can make differences, they tend to be big differences. So that’s the very positive upside for us — we only have to flex a few things very gradually and gently and we can make some significant inroads,” he said.
Analysis of 2009’s results shows that about half of Willmott Dixon’s staff fell into the “pragmatic green” category of employee, one of four broad clusters of staff identified from the responses of 20,000 employees. The other categories were “true green”, “sceptical green” and “least green”.
Most staff in small organisations (38.7%) could be classed as “true green”. In mid-sized firms most were “pragmatic green” (33.3%), while in large businesses most fell into the “sceptical green” category (33.8%).
Where employees can make a difference, there is a green dividend. Among statements where strong agreement is closely correlated with a high ranking are knowing where to put waste for recycling at work, being kept informed of company environmental policies and having a boss open to suggestions for making environmental improvements.
Jilly Forster, chief executive of the 2009 winner, said: “Once you find there’s engagement, you start having people coming up with their own ideas.”
Davidson said: “It’s the staff on the shop floor or at the construction site or in the factory who probably have the greatest influence over the environmental impact of the organisation. So getting them engaged is key. It’s never one fantastic light-bulb moment from the top; it’s lots of gradual changes generally that make a difference.”
Zoe Thomas
For the bosses of Britain’s companies, the ticket to green credibility comes only if the staff are included on the journey.
That is the conclusion from two years of The Sunday Times Green List, the benchmark against which businesses can test their green credentials. Organisations can register for the 2010 contest from today.
The contest not only measures efforts to cut the corporate carbon footprint, it also seeks employees’ views on how green their company is.
The top 60 green companies of 2009 ranged from blue-chip multinationals such as BT and Tesco to construction companies with a high environmental impact, including Willmott Dixon, Carillion and Skanska — and not to forget small marketing businesses such as the current champion, Forster, with only 51 staff.
They may differ in size and environmental impact, but what they share is a genuine commitment to putting green issues high up the agenda. They have the strategies and staff input to make it happen.
Our methodology allows companies to compete on a level playing field. Our top 20 this year featured eight companies with fewer than 250 employees, six mid-sized organisations and six with more than 5,000 staff. Eight had an environmental impact classified as low, six were medium and six high.
Will Ullstein, director of innovation at Munro Global, a market-research group and a partner in compiling the Green List, expects competition for a place on the 2010 list to be heated. “Organisations are increasingly understanding and reaping the benefits of running green operations. Media attention is propelling environmental issues up the agenda, and the countdown to the Copenhagen climate-change conference will only focus attention further,” he said.
With the benefit of two years’ data, companies can see the key trends that lead to success on the Green List. Genuine leadership on all things green is vital, as is getting the message across to the workforce.
Of the 52 questions on this year’s employee questionnaire, 13 test employees’ feelings about their bosses’ green credentials. Employees rate from “strongly agree” to “strongly disagree” their response to statements such as:
- My boss is open to suggestions for environmental improvements;
- My boss encourages me to recycle at work;
- My boss expects me to save the environment while he/she drives a gas-guzzling company car.
For companies, there is a close relationship between achieving high scores on the My Boss questions and doing well in the employee survey overall.
Sarah Davidson, technical director at Bureau Veritas, the environmental consultancy and our other partner in producing the Green List, said leadership is the place where the employer and staff surveys meet.
“This is where we get the connection between the employer and the employee responses,” said Davidson. “Leading by example in senior management is the key to linking the corporate programmes with the performance of the general workforce in the employee survey.”
Rick Willmott, chief executive of Willmott Dixon, the construction company that finished third in 2009, knows he has to lead from the front. “You have to set the agenda. You have to nail your colours to the mast,” he said.
Even though the building trade has by its nature a high environmental impact, Willmott thinks entrants should not be deterred.
“If we can make differences, they tend to be big differences. So that’s the very positive upside for us — we only have to flex a few things very gradually and gently and we can make some significant inroads,” he said.
Analysis of 2009’s results shows that about half of Willmott Dixon’s staff fell into the “pragmatic green” category of employee, one of four broad clusters of staff identified from the responses of 20,000 employees. The other categories were “true green”, “sceptical green” and “least green”.
Most staff in small organisations (38.7%) could be classed as “true green”. In mid-sized firms most were “pragmatic green” (33.3%), while in large businesses most fell into the “sceptical green” category (33.8%).
Where employees can make a difference, there is a green dividend. Among statements where strong agreement is closely correlated with a high ranking are knowing where to put waste for recycling at work, being kept informed of company environmental policies and having a boss open to suggestions for making environmental improvements.
Jilly Forster, chief executive of the 2009 winner, said: “Once you find there’s engagement, you start having people coming up with their own ideas.”
Davidson said: “It’s the staff on the shop floor or at the construction site or in the factory who probably have the greatest influence over the environmental impact of the organisation. So getting them engaged is key. It’s never one fantastic light-bulb moment from the top; it’s lots of gradual changes generally that make a difference.”
Greenhouse effects: Wall insulation
Tony Juniper
As the leaves turn gold, red and brown, and summer fades into memory, many of us will put on the heating. It may keep us comfortable, but heating causes about a third of our greenhouse-gas emissions. If your home is not well insulated, much of this heat is lost — which is a waste of money as well as energy.
In an uninsulated home, up to a third of the heat loss can be through the walls, so this is a good place to start. While older homes tend to have solid walls, those built after the mid-1920s are likely to have cavity walls — two layers of brick or blocks with a space between them. If you are not sure what type your home has, try measuring the thickness of the wall at a window or external door. Cavity walls will be at least 26cm thick. Brickwork with all bricks laid “side on” also indicate a cavity.
Building regulations specify that all homes built since about 1990 must have cavity walls insulated, but this doesn’t cover older homes.
In many cases, you can retro-fit insulation, but to establish whether this is possible — and whether additional ventilation is required — you will need a survey.
You cannot do the work yourself, so will need a properly registered installer. The Energy Saving Trust recommends choosing a member of at least one of these groups: the National Insulation Association, the Cavity Insulation Guarantee Agency and the British Board of Agrément. Each has a website with a list of registered installers — click on the links at energysavingtrust.org.uk.
To improve insulation, the cavity in the wall is filled with material such as mineral fibre, polystyrene beads, foam or glass, usually inserted through small holes drilled in the outside wall. This stops heat passing through the wall. Most companies charge about £500, but grants are available to all householders to cover 50%-100% of the cost (for details, visit government-grants.co.uk).
The investment should pay for itself within two or three years, while the bonus of lower heating bills will continue for many years to come — as will the environmental benefit.
If you don’t have cavity walls, don’t despair. There are ways to improve the insulation of solid walls, too, but they are for a future column.
Tony Juniper is an environmental campaigner and former director of Friends of the Earth; tonyjuniper.com
As the leaves turn gold, red and brown, and summer fades into memory, many of us will put on the heating. It may keep us comfortable, but heating causes about a third of our greenhouse-gas emissions. If your home is not well insulated, much of this heat is lost — which is a waste of money as well as energy.
In an uninsulated home, up to a third of the heat loss can be through the walls, so this is a good place to start. While older homes tend to have solid walls, those built after the mid-1920s are likely to have cavity walls — two layers of brick or blocks with a space between them. If you are not sure what type your home has, try measuring the thickness of the wall at a window or external door. Cavity walls will be at least 26cm thick. Brickwork with all bricks laid “side on” also indicate a cavity.
Building regulations specify that all homes built since about 1990 must have cavity walls insulated, but this doesn’t cover older homes.
In many cases, you can retro-fit insulation, but to establish whether this is possible — and whether additional ventilation is required — you will need a survey.
You cannot do the work yourself, so will need a properly registered installer. The Energy Saving Trust recommends choosing a member of at least one of these groups: the National Insulation Association, the Cavity Insulation Guarantee Agency and the British Board of Agrément. Each has a website with a list of registered installers — click on the links at energysavingtrust.org.uk.
To improve insulation, the cavity in the wall is filled with material such as mineral fibre, polystyrene beads, foam or glass, usually inserted through small holes drilled in the outside wall. This stops heat passing through the wall. Most companies charge about £500, but grants are available to all householders to cover 50%-100% of the cost (for details, visit government-grants.co.uk).
The investment should pay for itself within two or three years, while the bonus of lower heating bills will continue for many years to come — as will the environmental benefit.
If you don’t have cavity walls, don’t despair. There are ways to improve the insulation of solid walls, too, but they are for a future column.
Tony Juniper is an environmental campaigner and former director of Friends of the Earth; tonyjuniper.com
Saturday, 17 October 2009
Climate action shouldn't target poor famers
Rowan Williams's call to eat local ignores the plight of producers – and doesn't necessarily help the environmental cause
James MacGregor
guardian.co.uk, Friday 16 October 2009 09.00 BST
The Archbishop of Canterbury, Rowan Williams, has urged UK consumers to reduce their carbon footprint by shunning fruit and vegetables that have been flown from Africa.
But while many of his comments on climate change are sensible, this one is not. If followed, it could condemn hundreds of thousands of Africans to poverty.
Williams is well-meaning but he has fallen into a classic trap in treating the environment as sacrosanct, and worse, seeing simple solutions to complex environmental problems.
Stopping this trade would make hardly any impact on climate change but would harm over one million people in sub-Saharan Africa who depend on it for their livelihoods, and to pay for healthcare and the education of their children, girls in particular.
Air-freighted fruit and vegetables contribute less than one-tenth of one percent of the UK's greenhouse gas emissions.
Air freight is easy to demonise but even with transport included, African fruit and vegetables largely result in lower emissions than European ones that are grown in heated greenhouses. Far greater emissions result from the domestic transport of food goods within the United Kingdom than from flying them here in the first place, as the vast majority of African produce (over three-quarters) arrives in the UK in the belly of scheduled passenger planes.
Kenya's per capita emissions are just 0.2 tonnes per person per year. The average UK citizen emits 50 times more. Is it ethical to penalise Kenyan farmers for our excesses?
I worry that simplistic reactions to climate issues, such as counting "food miles", might change people's behaviour in ways that are actually bad for global sustainable development. We need to stop thinking about "food miles" and start thinking about "fair miles" (pdf), focusing less on how far food has travelled and more on how it has been produced and by whom.
On this occasion, I fear that Williams's comments might inspire a boycott of African products, with repercussions across the continent.
It is clear we are going to be living in a world increasingly dictated by climate. How we act now and in the near future will determine how quickly we hit climate change that is catastrophic.
Williams is missing a potential win-win which would have appeal across his global flock. Our consumption of African produce injects some £200m per year into rural areas of sub-Saharan Africa, where poverty is most acute.
The purchase of African produce is the single most important way that UK consumers engage with sub-Saharan Africa. Solidarity between UK consumers and African farmers should be at the cornerstone of our consumption patterns, mixing local and global social justice across the seasons.
I suggest Williams adopts a more nuanced approach that encourages UK consumers to eat local in season, and eat development-friendly out of season. In this way, they'll be supporting some of the world's poorest farmers by continuing to buy the food they produce.
James MacGregor
guardian.co.uk, Friday 16 October 2009 09.00 BST
The Archbishop of Canterbury, Rowan Williams, has urged UK consumers to reduce their carbon footprint by shunning fruit and vegetables that have been flown from Africa.
But while many of his comments on climate change are sensible, this one is not. If followed, it could condemn hundreds of thousands of Africans to poverty.
Williams is well-meaning but he has fallen into a classic trap in treating the environment as sacrosanct, and worse, seeing simple solutions to complex environmental problems.
Stopping this trade would make hardly any impact on climate change but would harm over one million people in sub-Saharan Africa who depend on it for their livelihoods, and to pay for healthcare and the education of their children, girls in particular.
Air-freighted fruit and vegetables contribute less than one-tenth of one percent of the UK's greenhouse gas emissions.
Air freight is easy to demonise but even with transport included, African fruit and vegetables largely result in lower emissions than European ones that are grown in heated greenhouses. Far greater emissions result from the domestic transport of food goods within the United Kingdom than from flying them here in the first place, as the vast majority of African produce (over three-quarters) arrives in the UK in the belly of scheduled passenger planes.
Kenya's per capita emissions are just 0.2 tonnes per person per year. The average UK citizen emits 50 times more. Is it ethical to penalise Kenyan farmers for our excesses?
I worry that simplistic reactions to climate issues, such as counting "food miles", might change people's behaviour in ways that are actually bad for global sustainable development. We need to stop thinking about "food miles" and start thinking about "fair miles" (pdf), focusing less on how far food has travelled and more on how it has been produced and by whom.
On this occasion, I fear that Williams's comments might inspire a boycott of African products, with repercussions across the continent.
It is clear we are going to be living in a world increasingly dictated by climate. How we act now and in the near future will determine how quickly we hit climate change that is catastrophic.
Williams is missing a potential win-win which would have appeal across his global flock. Our consumption of African produce injects some £200m per year into rural areas of sub-Saharan Africa, where poverty is most acute.
The purchase of African produce is the single most important way that UK consumers engage with sub-Saharan Africa. Solidarity between UK consumers and African farmers should be at the cornerstone of our consumption patterns, mixing local and global social justice across the seasons.
I suggest Williams adopts a more nuanced approach that encourages UK consumers to eat local in season, and eat development-friendly out of season. In this way, they'll be supporting some of the world's poorest farmers by continuing to buy the food they produce.
The environment in the decade of climate change
'The world is locked into insanely complex talks, and green groups and government shout as one that we have only a few years to avoid apocalypse'
John Vidal
The Guardian, Saturday 17 October 2009
My, how things have changed! In 2000, scientists from the Worldwatch thinktank in Washington teamed up with the UN to spot the greatest threats to the planet over the coming years. Top of the list was ecosystem collapse, such as deforestation and the demise of corals; second were health and diseases, such as Sars and Aids; and third was global poverty. The world's top environmental analysts gave climate change only four paragraphs in an eight-page essay – little more than malaria, trade, air pollution, population, fresh water or food supplies. Carbon emissions, they reported, were "continuing to decline" and global temperatures were "steady".
How quaint. Ten years later, climate change is equal top of the international agenda. The world is locked into insanely complex talks to reduce emissions, and green groups and government shout as one that we have only a few years to avoid apocalypse. The polar bear on the melting ice flow has become an iconic picture of the decade, business has painted itself green, we've changed our lightbulbs and wind power has taken off. As Al Gore – in 2000 the new presidential nominee of the Democratic party – said, "We are all environmentalists now."
All this in a decade? What on earth happened?
Climate change took off on the back of science and a storm of weather-related disasters. The huge floods in Mozambique that displaced millions of people in January 2000 laid down a marker of what was to come. Within months, India was struck by one of its worst droughts, and 4.5 million people were made homeless by floods in Cambodia and Thailand. By 2003, record numbers of cyclones, hurricanes, heatwaves, droughts, fires, whirlwinds and floods killed tens of thousands of people.
It took record temperatures in Britain and 30,000 people to die in the 2003 European heatwave to bring climate change closer to home, but what perhaps clinched the big idea that Earth was in trouble was the 2004 Indian Ocean tsunami, which killed more than 300,000 people. It had nothing to do with global warming but it reinforced the idea of the power of nature. Eight months later, Hurricane Katrina swept away parts of Louisiana along with much of the US's scepticism for climate change.
Meanwhile, more studies linked weather extremes to man-made emissions. Isolated contrarians claimed warming was natural, linked to sunspots and would be good for growing grapes in Britain. But in 2007 the Met office announced that 11 of the last 13 years had been the warmest on record, while a consensus of 2,000 UN climate scientists said climate change was not just "unequivocal" but most of it was man-made.
Corporate greenwash reached new heights in 2000, with BP rebranding itself Beyond Petroleum and the global nuclear industry calling itself "environmentally indispensable". The action then moved to Wall Street and the City; by 2007, Lehman Brothers in New York had set up an internal global council on climate change, and the same companies that had grown fat financing opencast coal mines, oil rigs and SUV plants began advising clients to Get Into Green.
In 2006, Nicholas Stern, a former World Bank economist at the UK Treasury, reported that business as usual in a climate-changing world meant economic meltdown. Politicians, industry, bankers and the media jumped aboard the green express, seeing dollar signs in emerging carbon markets and new technologies.
In fact, several other important events defined the environmental decade. One was China, which in 2008 officially overtook the US as the world's biggest greenhouse gas emitter. Its dash for development matched the west's consumption boom, and sucked in forests, minerals and fuel from all over the world. But by mid-decade its scientists and politicians had seen the plunging water tables, choked on the coal pollution and realised that it could not continue. China now leads the world in rolling out technological solutions.
Over the decade the world's population grew from just over 6.1 billion to about 6.9 billion. That increase is equivalent to nearly 12 new Britains, or three new Americas, or a new Africa; or almost exactly the number of people alive in 1750. The majority were born in the poorest countries, off the west's radar, but it's clear that population and climate will define the centuries ahead,
As 2009 ends, the climate situation appears to be worse than anyone had thought, with 4C temperature rises a certainty within 50 years if nothing changes. But like the calm before the storm in 2000, temperatures are steady and carbon emissions are falling because the recession has temporarily reduced industrial production and consumption.
So what about deforestation, the decline of coral reefs, the loss of fresh water, the rise of global diseases, pollution and all that poverty the UN feared?
Oh yes, they all got worse. But at least we can blame climate change now.
John Vidal
The Guardian, Saturday 17 October 2009
My, how things have changed! In 2000, scientists from the Worldwatch thinktank in Washington teamed up with the UN to spot the greatest threats to the planet over the coming years. Top of the list was ecosystem collapse, such as deforestation and the demise of corals; second were health and diseases, such as Sars and Aids; and third was global poverty. The world's top environmental analysts gave climate change only four paragraphs in an eight-page essay – little more than malaria, trade, air pollution, population, fresh water or food supplies. Carbon emissions, they reported, were "continuing to decline" and global temperatures were "steady".
How quaint. Ten years later, climate change is equal top of the international agenda. The world is locked into insanely complex talks to reduce emissions, and green groups and government shout as one that we have only a few years to avoid apocalypse. The polar bear on the melting ice flow has become an iconic picture of the decade, business has painted itself green, we've changed our lightbulbs and wind power has taken off. As Al Gore – in 2000 the new presidential nominee of the Democratic party – said, "We are all environmentalists now."
All this in a decade? What on earth happened?
Climate change took off on the back of science and a storm of weather-related disasters. The huge floods in Mozambique that displaced millions of people in January 2000 laid down a marker of what was to come. Within months, India was struck by one of its worst droughts, and 4.5 million people were made homeless by floods in Cambodia and Thailand. By 2003, record numbers of cyclones, hurricanes, heatwaves, droughts, fires, whirlwinds and floods killed tens of thousands of people.
It took record temperatures in Britain and 30,000 people to die in the 2003 European heatwave to bring climate change closer to home, but what perhaps clinched the big idea that Earth was in trouble was the 2004 Indian Ocean tsunami, which killed more than 300,000 people. It had nothing to do with global warming but it reinforced the idea of the power of nature. Eight months later, Hurricane Katrina swept away parts of Louisiana along with much of the US's scepticism for climate change.
Meanwhile, more studies linked weather extremes to man-made emissions. Isolated contrarians claimed warming was natural, linked to sunspots and would be good for growing grapes in Britain. But in 2007 the Met office announced that 11 of the last 13 years had been the warmest on record, while a consensus of 2,000 UN climate scientists said climate change was not just "unequivocal" but most of it was man-made.
Corporate greenwash reached new heights in 2000, with BP rebranding itself Beyond Petroleum and the global nuclear industry calling itself "environmentally indispensable". The action then moved to Wall Street and the City; by 2007, Lehman Brothers in New York had set up an internal global council on climate change, and the same companies that had grown fat financing opencast coal mines, oil rigs and SUV plants began advising clients to Get Into Green.
In 2006, Nicholas Stern, a former World Bank economist at the UK Treasury, reported that business as usual in a climate-changing world meant economic meltdown. Politicians, industry, bankers and the media jumped aboard the green express, seeing dollar signs in emerging carbon markets and new technologies.
In fact, several other important events defined the environmental decade. One was China, which in 2008 officially overtook the US as the world's biggest greenhouse gas emitter. Its dash for development matched the west's consumption boom, and sucked in forests, minerals and fuel from all over the world. But by mid-decade its scientists and politicians had seen the plunging water tables, choked on the coal pollution and realised that it could not continue. China now leads the world in rolling out technological solutions.
Over the decade the world's population grew from just over 6.1 billion to about 6.9 billion. That increase is equivalent to nearly 12 new Britains, or three new Americas, or a new Africa; or almost exactly the number of people alive in 1750. The majority were born in the poorest countries, off the west's radar, but it's clear that population and climate will define the centuries ahead,
As 2009 ends, the climate situation appears to be worse than anyone had thought, with 4C temperature rises a certainty within 50 years if nothing changes. But like the calm before the storm in 2000, temperatures are steady and carbon emissions are falling because the recession has temporarily reduced industrial production and consumption.
So what about deforestation, the decline of coral reefs, the loss of fresh water, the rise of global diseases, pollution and all that poverty the UN feared?
Oh yes, they all got worse. But at least we can blame climate change now.
Miliband calls on rich countries to make firm offers on cutting CO2
Ed Miliband urges the US to clarify its position ahead of a major economies forum in London
John Vidal, environment editor
guardian.co.uk, Friday 16 October 2009 13.51 BST
Britain has ramped up the pressure on the US and other countries to come up with firm targets and commitments to reduce carbon emissions to ensure a new international climate change treaty can be agreed in December in Copenhagen.
Speaking ahead of a two day meeting of the world's 17 largest economies in London, climate change and energy secretary Ed Miliband called on the US to clarify its position.
"We are narrowing the gap [between countries]. China needs to make a substantial contribution. It's important that the US makes as much progress as possible. They must come to Copenhagen with a clear sense of what they want to do.
"Different countries are at different stages. We do need developed countries' numbers but also developing country actions. There is no solution to climate change without developing country actions," he said.
Miliband said that global emissions were presently about 50 gigatonnes of C02 a year but these need to reduce to 20Gt by 2050 to hold temperature increases to 2C and avoid catastrophic climate change.
"We need to reduce emissions to about 44Gt by 2020 and 35Gt by 2030. We already have offers on the table to get to 48Gt by 2020," he said.
The major economies forum (Mef) which starts this weekend will cover most of the issues now deadlocked in the UN climate talks but it is not an official part of the negotiations. But with just five days of formal talks left before negotiators and politicians go to Copenhagen to thrash out a final deal, the Mef is seen as an essential forum for governments to prepare their positions.
Brazil this week became the latest major developing country to propose emission cuts, suggesting it could cap its greenhouse gas emissions at 2005 levels by 2020. "We can reach 2020 with levels similar to those of 2005, even with economic growth of 4% annually," said environment minister Carlos Minc.
It follows India, China, Indonesia and Mexico, which have all indicated they are prepared to pass national legislation to curb emissions.
Asked whether the developing countries have done enough to fulfil their sirde of the bargain, Miliband said: "Numbers are essential at Copenhagen. We are going all out to get them. The most important thing is the mid term actions, [ie 2020]. Targets for 2050 are important but it's more important to have near term targets," said Miliband.
However, there is little prospect that the US will go to Copenhagen with firm figures and proposals because the domestic legislation that it needs to pass is held up in Congress. President Obama has indicated that the US will need more time, potentially forcing the talks into 2010.
Also expected to be discussed in London will be the size and form of the financial package to be offered by industrialised countries to developing countries to help them to adapt to climate change. Britain has proposed $100bn a year from the international community, but developing countries expect far more.
The 17 major economies participating are Australia, Brazil, Canada, China, the EU, France, Germany, India, Indonesia, Italy, Japan, Korea, Mexico, Russia, South Africa, the UK, and United States.
The EU and the US have insisted that most countries agree to curb emissions, even though developing countries are not historically responsible for climate change. The poorest countries in the world would not be obliged to cut emissions.
John Vidal, environment editor
guardian.co.uk, Friday 16 October 2009 13.51 BST
Britain has ramped up the pressure on the US and other countries to come up with firm targets and commitments to reduce carbon emissions to ensure a new international climate change treaty can be agreed in December in Copenhagen.
Speaking ahead of a two day meeting of the world's 17 largest economies in London, climate change and energy secretary Ed Miliband called on the US to clarify its position.
"We are narrowing the gap [between countries]. China needs to make a substantial contribution. It's important that the US makes as much progress as possible. They must come to Copenhagen with a clear sense of what they want to do.
"Different countries are at different stages. We do need developed countries' numbers but also developing country actions. There is no solution to climate change without developing country actions," he said.
Miliband said that global emissions were presently about 50 gigatonnes of C02 a year but these need to reduce to 20Gt by 2050 to hold temperature increases to 2C and avoid catastrophic climate change.
"We need to reduce emissions to about 44Gt by 2020 and 35Gt by 2030. We already have offers on the table to get to 48Gt by 2020," he said.
The major economies forum (Mef) which starts this weekend will cover most of the issues now deadlocked in the UN climate talks but it is not an official part of the negotiations. But with just five days of formal talks left before negotiators and politicians go to Copenhagen to thrash out a final deal, the Mef is seen as an essential forum for governments to prepare their positions.
Brazil this week became the latest major developing country to propose emission cuts, suggesting it could cap its greenhouse gas emissions at 2005 levels by 2020. "We can reach 2020 with levels similar to those of 2005, even with economic growth of 4% annually," said environment minister Carlos Minc.
It follows India, China, Indonesia and Mexico, which have all indicated they are prepared to pass national legislation to curb emissions.
Asked whether the developing countries have done enough to fulfil their sirde of the bargain, Miliband said: "Numbers are essential at Copenhagen. We are going all out to get them. The most important thing is the mid term actions, [ie 2020]. Targets for 2050 are important but it's more important to have near term targets," said Miliband.
However, there is little prospect that the US will go to Copenhagen with firm figures and proposals because the domestic legislation that it needs to pass is held up in Congress. President Obama has indicated that the US will need more time, potentially forcing the talks into 2010.
Also expected to be discussed in London will be the size and form of the financial package to be offered by industrialised countries to developing countries to help them to adapt to climate change. Britain has proposed $100bn a year from the international community, but developing countries expect far more.
The 17 major economies participating are Australia, Brazil, Canada, China, the EU, France, Germany, India, Indonesia, Italy, Japan, Korea, Mexico, Russia, South Africa, the UK, and United States.
The EU and the US have insisted that most countries agree to curb emissions, even though developing countries are not historically responsible for climate change. The poorest countries in the world would not be obliged to cut emissions.
President Obama must come to Copenhagen to save climate change talks says Ed Miliband
President Obama must personally intervene to ensure the world reaches an ambitous deal to stop catastrophic global warming, according to British energy minister Ed Miliband.
By Louise Gray, Environment Correspondent Published: 1:16PM BST 16 Oct 2009
The UN Climate Change Conference in Copenhagen in December is due to agree a replacement to the Kyoto Protocol.
However so far the 190 countries involved in the deal have failed to agree on how the world can keep temperature rise below two degrees C (3.6 degrees F).
Mr Miliband, the UK Energy and Climate Change Secretary, said it would help if world leaders attend the conference to ensure all countries take action on cutting carbon emissions.
Gordon Brown, the British Prime Minister, has already pledged to attend and President Obama is likely to be in the area having picked up his Nobel Peace Prize at around the same time.
Mr Miliband pointed out that the key decision to keep temperature rise below 2 degrees C (3.6 degrees F), at the G8 Summit in July, only happened because it was pushed by world leaders rather than just negotiators.
"I think the involvement of leaders is absolutely essential," he said.
In a last-ditch attempt to ensure an ambitious deal is met, the UK is hosting the Major Economies Forum (MEF) next week that will bring together ministers and officials from around the world.
Mr Miliband said the Government was "determined to throw everything" at getting a successful deal.
"The day will concentrate minds, the MEF is bringing pieces together. We are throwing everything at it. We are determined to get a deal at Copenhagen," he said.
He said rich countries must agree to legally binding mid-term targets to cut carbon emissions. At the moment this will be in the range of 25 and 40 per cent by 2020. This will be particularly difficult for the US where the President Obama is struggling to get through the necessary legislation.
"We are going all out to get an agreement with numbers. You cannot have success at Copenhagen without numbers," he said. "Numbers are absolutely essential."
Mr Miliband also said poorer countries like China and India need to agree to take action by agreeing to cut emissions against "business as usual".
"We also need developing countries to take action because there is no solution to the problem of climate change – given that most of the emissions will come from developing countries in the future – unless they do something."
By Louise Gray, Environment Correspondent Published: 1:16PM BST 16 Oct 2009
The UN Climate Change Conference in Copenhagen in December is due to agree a replacement to the Kyoto Protocol.
However so far the 190 countries involved in the deal have failed to agree on how the world can keep temperature rise below two degrees C (3.6 degrees F).
Mr Miliband, the UK Energy and Climate Change Secretary, said it would help if world leaders attend the conference to ensure all countries take action on cutting carbon emissions.
Gordon Brown, the British Prime Minister, has already pledged to attend and President Obama is likely to be in the area having picked up his Nobel Peace Prize at around the same time.
Mr Miliband pointed out that the key decision to keep temperature rise below 2 degrees C (3.6 degrees F), at the G8 Summit in July, only happened because it was pushed by world leaders rather than just negotiators.
"I think the involvement of leaders is absolutely essential," he said.
In a last-ditch attempt to ensure an ambitious deal is met, the UK is hosting the Major Economies Forum (MEF) next week that will bring together ministers and officials from around the world.
Mr Miliband said the Government was "determined to throw everything" at getting a successful deal.
"The day will concentrate minds, the MEF is bringing pieces together. We are throwing everything at it. We are determined to get a deal at Copenhagen," he said.
He said rich countries must agree to legally binding mid-term targets to cut carbon emissions. At the moment this will be in the range of 25 and 40 per cent by 2020. This will be particularly difficult for the US where the President Obama is struggling to get through the necessary legislation.
"We are going all out to get an agreement with numbers. You cannot have success at Copenhagen without numbers," he said. "Numbers are absolutely essential."
Mr Miliband also said poorer countries like China and India need to agree to take action by agreeing to cut emissions against "business as usual".
"We also need developing countries to take action because there is no solution to the problem of climate change – given that most of the emissions will come from developing countries in the future – unless they do something."
Britain's first carbon capture and storage plant to be built in Yorkshire
EU funds demonstration project with €180m award to be matched by UK government for 900MW coal-fired power station
Alok Jha and Tim Webb
guardian.co.uk, Friday 16 October 2009 17.36 BST
Britain's first carbon capture and storage demonstration plant will be built at Hatfield in Yorkshire, thanks to a €180m award from the European Union. The funds, announced today, will be matched by the UK government.
The money has been awarded to Powerfuel Power for a 900MW coal-fired electricity plant that could start operating as soon as 2014. The company will use "pre-combustion" CCS technology, which removes carbon dioxide from the coal before it is burned, and then pipes it to be buried in an offshore gas field 100 miles away. Pre-combustion CCS should trap more CO2 than post-combustion techniques.
Other shortlisted CCS projects in the UK, from Scottish Power at Longannet and E.ON at the now-delayed power station at Kingsnorth, will not receive money from the EU fund. But eight other CCS demonstration plants will be subsidised across Germany, the Netherlands, Poland, Spain and Italy.
"CCS is moving off the drawing board and into practical application. It's a technology that has the potential to reduce CO2 emissions into the atmosphere by a vast amount," said Chris Davies, the Liberal Democrat Euro-MP responsible for moving CCS legislation through the European Parliament last year.
Powerfuel wants to build a integrated gas-combined cycle power station at Hatfield. Coal is first gasified to produce carbon monoxide and hydrogen. The former is reacted with water to produce CO2, which is captured, and more hydrogen. The hydrogen can be diverted to a turbine where it can be burned to produce electricity. Alternatively, some of this gas can be bled off to feed hydrogen fuel cells for cars.
Richard Budge, owner of Powerfuel, said he was confident of securing the £2.4bn total funding he would need to build the power stationand expects the project to be completed by the end of 2014. He said that unless more power plants were built, the UK would face a shortfall in electricity capacity by 2016. "We have to do something, otherwise we better all start buying candles."
CCS is widely seen as a critical technology in delivering energy security at the same time as cutting greenhouse gas emissions. It would allow the world's abundant coal reserves to be used to generate electricity but sequester the emissions. However, it has yet to be demonstrated at commercial scale anywhere in the world, a task that will cost billions of pounds.
A spokesperson for the Department for Energy and Climate Change welcomed the Hatfield funding: "The UK is in a strong position on CCS and we expect to be one of the first countries in the world to demonstrate this technology."
Last week E.ON delayed plans to build its own CCS coal plant at Kingsnorth for up to three years, blaming reduced energy demand caused by the recession. The company denied the EU decision had been a factor. "Whether we did or didn't win the funding played no part in the decision to delay Kingsnorth ," said a spokesperson. "We remain a contender in the UK government's CCS competition to build up to four demonstration plants.
In its report the EU said that Hatfield's plan to use pre-combustion CCS was "a highly innovative concept". In addition, the EU was impressed with plans to create a cluster of CCS projects in the area , allowing several projects to share pipeline and storage infrastructure in the Yorkshire and Humberside area.
Yorkshire Liberal Democrat MEP Diana Wallis said: "This announcement should be welcomed as being great news for the region's economy and for combating global climate change. Hopefully, it will the first of many such projects as the idea is to develop a 'Humber Cluster' of CCS projects that within 15 years could curb the emission of up to 70m tonnes of CO2 into the atmosphere."
The EU wants up to 12 commercial CCS projects to be demonstrated around the continent by 2015. Funding will come from a €1bn economic recovery programme, with additional support of €6bn expected to be announced next year.
Alok Jha and Tim Webb
guardian.co.uk, Friday 16 October 2009 17.36 BST
Britain's first carbon capture and storage demonstration plant will be built at Hatfield in Yorkshire, thanks to a €180m award from the European Union. The funds, announced today, will be matched by the UK government.
The money has been awarded to Powerfuel Power for a 900MW coal-fired electricity plant that could start operating as soon as 2014. The company will use "pre-combustion" CCS technology, which removes carbon dioxide from the coal before it is burned, and then pipes it to be buried in an offshore gas field 100 miles away. Pre-combustion CCS should trap more CO2 than post-combustion techniques.
Other shortlisted CCS projects in the UK, from Scottish Power at Longannet and E.ON at the now-delayed power station at Kingsnorth, will not receive money from the EU fund. But eight other CCS demonstration plants will be subsidised across Germany, the Netherlands, Poland, Spain and Italy.
"CCS is moving off the drawing board and into practical application. It's a technology that has the potential to reduce CO2 emissions into the atmosphere by a vast amount," said Chris Davies, the Liberal Democrat Euro-MP responsible for moving CCS legislation through the European Parliament last year.
Powerfuel wants to build a integrated gas-combined cycle power station at Hatfield. Coal is first gasified to produce carbon monoxide and hydrogen. The former is reacted with water to produce CO2, which is captured, and more hydrogen. The hydrogen can be diverted to a turbine where it can be burned to produce electricity. Alternatively, some of this gas can be bled off to feed hydrogen fuel cells for cars.
Richard Budge, owner of Powerfuel, said he was confident of securing the £2.4bn total funding he would need to build the power stationand expects the project to be completed by the end of 2014. He said that unless more power plants were built, the UK would face a shortfall in electricity capacity by 2016. "We have to do something, otherwise we better all start buying candles."
CCS is widely seen as a critical technology in delivering energy security at the same time as cutting greenhouse gas emissions. It would allow the world's abundant coal reserves to be used to generate electricity but sequester the emissions. However, it has yet to be demonstrated at commercial scale anywhere in the world, a task that will cost billions of pounds.
A spokesperson for the Department for Energy and Climate Change welcomed the Hatfield funding: "The UK is in a strong position on CCS and we expect to be one of the first countries in the world to demonstrate this technology."
Last week E.ON delayed plans to build its own CCS coal plant at Kingsnorth for up to three years, blaming reduced energy demand caused by the recession. The company denied the EU decision had been a factor. "Whether we did or didn't win the funding played no part in the decision to delay Kingsnorth ," said a spokesperson. "We remain a contender in the UK government's CCS competition to build up to four demonstration plants.
In its report the EU said that Hatfield's plan to use pre-combustion CCS was "a highly innovative concept". In addition, the EU was impressed with plans to create a cluster of CCS projects in the area , allowing several projects to share pipeline and storage infrastructure in the Yorkshire and Humberside area.
Yorkshire Liberal Democrat MEP Diana Wallis said: "This announcement should be welcomed as being great news for the region's economy and for combating global climate change. Hopefully, it will the first of many such projects as the idea is to develop a 'Humber Cluster' of CCS projects that within 15 years could curb the emission of up to 70m tonnes of CO2 into the atmosphere."
The EU wants up to 12 commercial CCS projects to be demonstrated around the continent by 2015. Funding will come from a €1bn economic recovery programme, with additional support of €6bn expected to be announced next year.
Green consumerism can avert climate disaster, say top firms
Tesco, Coca-Cola and Reckitt Benckiser bosses press politicians for action and argue against need to curb economic growth
Patrick Wintour, political editor
guardian.co.uk, Friday 16 October 2009 18.07 BST
Climate change catastrophe can be averted by "greening" consumer behaviour rather than by curbing economic growth and mass consumerism, leaders of some of the world's biggest businesses including Tesco, Coca-Cola and Reckitt Benckiser argued today.
They urged politicians to be braver at the Copenhagen talks on climate change in December, saying voters could be persuaded of the need to act. They were speaking, along with David Cameron and Professor Robert Puttnam, the sociologist and advocate of the importance of social capital, at a conference in London on the role of the consumer and business in combating climate change.
The degree of focus on climate change by the businesspeople would have been impossible five years ago. But some in the audience angrily insisted that they underestimated the need to slow consumerism.
Sir Terry Leahy, the chief executive of Tesco, told the conference that combating climate change was now the number one priority of his company, and announced that his multibillion-pound business would be zero-carbon by 2050. "Survival is the issue, not just for our business, but the entire planet," he said.
The president of Coca-Cola, Muhtar Kent, warned politicians: "Act now or you will fail, and so will the world. Politicians need to think like businesses and think about the long term." He claimed that consumers now put the environment at the top of their priorities in all of its customer surveys, including in developing countries such as Brazil and Mexico.
Bart Becht, the chief executive of Reckitt Benckiser, expressed his fear that a deal would not be made in Copenhagen. "Are we there yet? We are nowhere near. Government is not set up to handle global issues effectively. They have short time horizons, and elections, but we are institutions built to last."
Paul Polman, of Unilever, said: "We need a whole new business model, but it takes time."
The businessmen repeatedly argued that neither regulation nor government would be sufficient to bring emissions down, pointing out that 70% of emissions came from consumers.
Kent said Coca-Cola's surveys suggested that as much as 70% of future advertising would have an environmental focus, and his aim was to reduce by 40% the energy footprint of its 10m refrigerators across 206 countries.
He said: "I think it is a fallacy to think growth and a sustainable world are mutually exclusive."
Kent pointed out in the next decade there would be many millions more middle class people living in cities. "How can businesses continue to serve the needs of these new middle classes and yet embed sustainability into business plans? That is the goal."
Leahy praised the carbon reduction targets being set by governments, but said: "It is only by realising our potential as people, citizens, consumers, as users that we can turn targets into reality. It will be a transition achieved not by some great invention or some great act of parliament, but through the billions of choices made by consumers every day all over the world."
He warned that too often climate change was seen as a threat that "is turned into a demand for retreat. Consumers are told they must accept ever greater limits on their ambitions and a reduction on what they can desire all so their emissions may be cut. This is not just unrealistic, but also fails to see the enormous positive potential of consumers."
Patrick Wintour, political editor
guardian.co.uk, Friday 16 October 2009 18.07 BST
Climate change catastrophe can be averted by "greening" consumer behaviour rather than by curbing economic growth and mass consumerism, leaders of some of the world's biggest businesses including Tesco, Coca-Cola and Reckitt Benckiser argued today.
They urged politicians to be braver at the Copenhagen talks on climate change in December, saying voters could be persuaded of the need to act. They were speaking, along with David Cameron and Professor Robert Puttnam, the sociologist and advocate of the importance of social capital, at a conference in London on the role of the consumer and business in combating climate change.
The degree of focus on climate change by the businesspeople would have been impossible five years ago. But some in the audience angrily insisted that they underestimated the need to slow consumerism.
Sir Terry Leahy, the chief executive of Tesco, told the conference that combating climate change was now the number one priority of his company, and announced that his multibillion-pound business would be zero-carbon by 2050. "Survival is the issue, not just for our business, but the entire planet," he said.
The president of Coca-Cola, Muhtar Kent, warned politicians: "Act now or you will fail, and so will the world. Politicians need to think like businesses and think about the long term." He claimed that consumers now put the environment at the top of their priorities in all of its customer surveys, including in developing countries such as Brazil and Mexico.
Bart Becht, the chief executive of Reckitt Benckiser, expressed his fear that a deal would not be made in Copenhagen. "Are we there yet? We are nowhere near. Government is not set up to handle global issues effectively. They have short time horizons, and elections, but we are institutions built to last."
Paul Polman, of Unilever, said: "We need a whole new business model, but it takes time."
The businessmen repeatedly argued that neither regulation nor government would be sufficient to bring emissions down, pointing out that 70% of emissions came from consumers.
Kent said Coca-Cola's surveys suggested that as much as 70% of future advertising would have an environmental focus, and his aim was to reduce by 40% the energy footprint of its 10m refrigerators across 206 countries.
He said: "I think it is a fallacy to think growth and a sustainable world are mutually exclusive."
Kent pointed out in the next decade there would be many millions more middle class people living in cities. "How can businesses continue to serve the needs of these new middle classes and yet embed sustainability into business plans? That is the goal."
Leahy praised the carbon reduction targets being set by governments, but said: "It is only by realising our potential as people, citizens, consumers, as users that we can turn targets into reality. It will be a transition achieved not by some great invention or some great act of parliament, but through the billions of choices made by consumers every day all over the world."
He warned that too often climate change was seen as a threat that "is turned into a demand for retreat. Consumers are told they must accept ever greater limits on their ambitions and a reduction on what they can desire all so their emissions may be cut. This is not just unrealistic, but also fails to see the enormous positive potential of consumers."
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