UK climate change programme : memoranda relating to the inquiry submitted to the Committee / Environment, Transport and Regional Affairs Committee.

  • Great Britain. Parliament. House of Commons. Environment, Transport, and Regional Affairs Committee.
Date:
1999
Catalogue details

Licence: Open Government Licence

Credit: UK climate change programme : memoranda relating to the inquiry submitted to the Committee / Environment, Transport and Regional Affairs Committee. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    The economic and other costs of the options in the Climate Change Strategy. The economic effects of investment in energy efficiency should not be viewed as a one off cost. The associated costs of energy efficiency are an investment in the country as a whole which pays off not just in savings in Carbon, but also provides a host of social benefits including: Thousands of jobs across the country, not just in the administration of the schemes, but also in the installation and materials manufacturing industries. The National Audit Office in the Value for Money report on HEES concluded that HEES has provided an extra 1,600 jobs and 2,100 training opportunities, spread between manufacturers, installers and Eaga itself. The benefits for vulnerable households across the country are also obvious. Warmer homes which are cheaper to heat, releasing money previously tied up within the households budget. The potential savings from relatively “low level” assistance is of the order of 15 per cent, about 50 per cent of which can be expected to be taken as increased comfort rather than energy savings. Warmer homes help combat the health problems associated with cold, damp housing. Asthma, respiratory problems and hypothermia are all prevalent in occupants in the poorest housing across the country. Releasing extensive resources within the NHS. The social benefits, coupled with a low case saving of 1 MtC per year by 2010 indicates that investment in energy efficiency has many (quantifiable) benefits—not all of which are currently fully appreciated, but which can be readily built upon. 5 January 1999 Memorandum by Friends of the Earth (CC 7) UK CiLimate CHANGE PROGRAMME Friends of the Earth welcomes the opportunity provided by the Committee’s enquiry to submit evidence on the UK Government’s Climate Change Consultation. While the Kyoto Protocol sets legally binding targets for the basket of six gases, this submission focuses on carbon dioxide emissions, the most significant of the climate changing gases and the gas for which domestic action is most readily quantifiable. Friends of the Earth’s submission to the Government’s consultation will address all six gases. In Friends of the Earth’s view, global climate change is probably the single most serious environmental and social threat facing populations of the world and represents a fundamental challenge to economies driven by coal, oil and gas. While the Protocol adopted in Kyoto in December 1997 represented a very important first step, if ratified, in tackling this threat, successive and more sweeping cuts in global emissions of climate changing gases will be needed if the worst impacts of climate change are to be averted. The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) has advised governments that even if global emissions of carbon dioxide from fossil fuel burning were to be stabilised at just the present rate of 6.5 Gigatons of carbon per year, they would still lead by 2100 to a near doubling of pre-industrial atmospheric concentrations which would result, in all probability, in at least a global 2 C degree warming: that is the benchmark used by the IPCC for the onset of dangerous climatic change. While these remain predictions and many uncertainties remain in climate change science, Friends of the Earth considers that global trends in extreme weather events underline the urgency and need for early action. This was reinforced in November 1998 by the UK’s Hadley Centre which predicted that global climate change impacts would be more severe than suggested by the IPCC. The IPCC has also told governments that worst impacts of climate change could be averted if global emissions of carbon dioxide were to be reduced by 60 per cent by 2050, i.e., to around 2.5 Gigatons per year and stabilised thereafter. This is likely to mean cut of the order of 80 per cent for industrialised nations by 2050. The UK Government’s manifesto commitment to a unilateral cut in CO, emissions by 20 per cent by 2010, greater than its legal obligation under the Kyoto Protocol, is therefore welcomed by Friends of the Earth. Friends of the Earth considers that there are considerable environmental, economic and employment advantages which could be achieved from a range of policies to meet this target and that the Government should implement this manifesto commitment regardless of the action taken by other countries. Such a step would not be damaging to the UK economy and would be important in ensuring that UK industry develops a significant competitive advantage. Friends of the Earth considers that such leadership by example would also considerably strengthen the influence of the UK Government in the international climate negotiations under the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change and will be critically important in proving that significant emission reductions are achievable in a cost effective manner which dées not damage economies.