Examination of witnesses (Questions 80
- 97)
WEDNESDAY 5 JULY 2000
PROFESSOR SIR
TOM BLUNDELL,
DR SUSAN
OWENS and PROFESSOR
BRIAN HOSKINS
80. In terms of the proportion of CO2 which
you produce when you burn a fossil fuel, the vast majority of
that CO2 comes from burning the methane not from this slight contaminant
which comes out of the ground.
(Professor Sir Tom Blundell) No, it was a proof of
concept, proof of technology, the fact that it exists. People
say it is all in the future, unproven technology—I believe
you were saying that—but this is a technology which is being
used now.
81. The impression you have given is that somehow
you have developed technologies which can resolve the problem
of what happens when you burn fossil fuels.
(Professor Sir Tom Blundell) In principle we are saying
that. What we are saying is that if you burn methane at a power
station or coal and produce carbon dioxide, if it is in a concentrated
large source, in principle you can remove it and store it. We
were just giving an example of where a similar operation is being
carried out now.
Christine Butler
82. I think we can agree on the efficiencies
you are suggesting and on the urgency for new technologies to
be produced. Which do you think would have the greater influence
on international thinking, that is governments, bearing in mind
that fossil fuel resources are finite, the actions of OPEC or
an International Conference on Climate Change?
(Professor Sir Tom Blundell) I am not sure what the
implications are.
83. Price rises or tax rises.
(Professor Sir Tom Blundell) It is clear that we cannot
burn all the fossil fuels which exist. We have to have a policy
in place which ensures that we have alternatives before there
is an exhaustion of the fossil fuels available, even with the
increasing prices in getting the more difficult of these energy
sources.
84. What weight did you give in considering
this report to the fact that they are finite resources, that they
are likely to become more and more scarce and therefore more and
more expensive to the international trading community?
(Professor Sir Tom Blundell) Yes, we gave a lot of
thought to that. The conclusion we came to was that we need to
have considerable restraints way before the price increases through
the finishing of fossil fuel resources has an impact.
85. Do you agree that the oil companies are
taking this to the wire? Major oil companies, BP for instance,
are investing very heavily in photo-voltaic technology, others
are doing different things. They are aware of the future but everyone
seems very reluctant to do anything about it on a commercial scale
at the moment. They are all waiting behind each other, hence OPEC
are now thinking of actually bringing down oil prices. It is all
to do with competition for this year and next year, is it not?
However can we break that kind of thinking?
(Professor Sir Tom Blundell) It is a difficult challenge
to break.
(Professor Hoskins) In terms of the global resource,
the global resource will not be exhausted. In terms of the UK,
we can envisage that we might be reliant on a pipeline from Russia
for our gas and from Middle East/OPEC for our oil. That is certainly
a vulnerable situation although the resource is there globally.
We are not saying that the resource depletion is the restriction
globally, but there can be important implications. Certainly the
rise in price, the OPEC changes in price, are to keep us hooked
on oil. That is what they are trying to do because they want us
there and they know this rise in price could lead in the opposite
direction.
86. What is forecast then for fossil fuels and
their depletion? I heard that it could be very soon.
(Professor Hoskins) It does depend. We can take the
economic resource or the estimate of the total resource.
87. Economic resource, or we should all be at
war again, should we not?
(Professor Hoskins) If we go on as "business
as usual" for the next 100 to 150 years, 200 years certainly,
we shall probably have exhausted all the resource.
Mr Brake
88. Is it really sensible and safe science to
propose storing CO2 in underground strata? Is there not an enormous
risk there? Secondly, what do you believe would be the most cost
effective and most popular way of making up the difference between
the Government's 20 per cent CO2 emission target and the 17.5
per cent which I understand is identified in their climate change
strategy?
(Professor Hoskins) If we put the CO2 back in places
where oil and gas have been stored over the years, then one can
be reasonably confident that we might be dealing with a place
that this remains, but of course more research is necessary. That
gives a good basis that if these have been stored naturally over
millions of years, one can hope if we put back the CO2 it would
also be contained there. I wouldhope that is a sort of answer
to the first part butmore research is needed to make sure that
is thecase.
89. What is the single most cost effective,
most popular way of making up the difference between the Government's
20 per cent CO2 reduction target and the 17.5 per cent which has
been identified in their climate change strategy? There is a shortfall.
(Professor Sir Tom Blundell) We do have a slight problem
with that. I am not sure we are convinced they are going to find
the 17.5 per cent from the measures indicated.
(Professor Hoskins) We should not concentrate too
much on the 2010 and whether they are going to be two megatonnes
of carbon short or not. It is actually after that, because even
their own estimates show that after that emissions go up and it
is after that the emissions have to keep going down. That is the
crucial time. It would be a mistake to ask whether they are going
to get plus or minus one in 2010. It is whether they are going
to be plus or minus ten in 2020 which is what we should be focusing
on and that is why our longer term view to 2050 is important.
It is important not to deal too much with the detail of 2010.
It is when the nuclear power is going that we should be doing
more. It looks as though we are going to be in difficulty then.
We have had it easyup to now. We have had North Sea gas, we hadthe
nuclear there, we have not had to do toomuch. Beyond 2010 we are
going to have to do quite a lot.
(Dr Owens) As you will have seen in our report, we
believe there is something of a hole in the Government's draft
climate change programme. We felt that 10 million tonnes of carbon
which might have gone out of the annual emissions by 2010 is a
bit difficult to account for, partly because we are sceptical
of the amount of progress which will be made in the transport
sector and partly because we are sceptical of the amount of progress
which will be made in reducing household energy consumption. To
return to your question on what might be a popular way perhaps
not only of making up that increment you mentioned but of achieving
the targets in the first place, as you identified in your own
report, many organisations have identified huge potential to reduce
energy consumption in the domestic sector whilst at the same time
helping to solve the problem of fuel poverty and giving people
warmer and more comfortable homes. That sounds to me like quite
a popular set of measures. In the longer term I should suggest
that a society where we were not being choked by motorcars might
also ultimately prove to be popular, though in the short term
achievement is difficult.
Chairman: You are now on very sensitiveground.
Not until we remove the males from this earth.
Mrs Gorman
90. You said just a moment ago that if we were
to go on as we are, within about 200 years we shall possibly have
exhausted our fossil fuels. Can I put it to you that the degree
of scientific progress over the last 200 years leads us to be
optimistic that we shall surely have developed new concepts of
energy production which would preclude us in present terms skewing
our economy to deal with what is the current situation?
(Professor Sir Tom Blundell) Carbon dioxide is cumulative
in the atmosphere. If we put it in now and wait for new technologies,
we will have caused the problem. That is the message. It is not
the rate per year we are producing carbon dioxide. It hangs around
for a couple of hundred years, so it is a cumulative effect. That
is the issue. If we burn all the fossil fuels we shall have 8
degrees increase in temperature.
(Professor Hoskins) Yes, we are talking about a global
average in terms of 10 degrees or something and maybe on northern
continents of the order of 20 degrees. That is more than the difference
between an ice age and now.
91. I am talking here about the development
of new technologies such as fuel cells which would preclude us
needing to use the fossil fuels which are probably a rather wasteful
form of developing energy for our needs. You as scientists, pure
scientists as I read in the list at the back of the report, would
have a more optimistic view. Put it another way. The humanities
and sociological group of your commission far outnumber the scientists
and the tail is wagging the scientific dog. That is to say the
remedies you are offering are to do with an immediate situation
which as scientists you should be thinking of as being something
temporary.
(Professor Sir Tom Blundell) I am flattered by your
confidence in scientists like ourselves and we are certainly doing
the best we can. We believe other actions are required.
Mr Bennett
92. You have a nice quote from Dickens at the
beginning of your report. Was that to be a reference to climate
change or was it to be a reference to your report?
(Professor Sir Tom Blundell) I never managed to ask
that.
Chairman
93. "Are these the shadows of the things
that will be or are they shadows of things that may be only?"
(Professor Sir Tom Blundell) Certainly the climate
changes will be.
Mr Bennett
94. Profits of doom have either been ignored
until they have become irrelevant or until it is too late. Convince
me that you have not been wasting your time.
(Professor Sir Tom Blundell) I believe that in the
very short term, if people and the Government could see that some
of the efficiencies we are recommending could lead to increased
savings and increased competitiveness we should certainly see
people moving much more in that direction.
95. Do you think it is a question of Government
leadership or do you think it is more important to convince my
electorate?
(Professor Sir Tom Blundell) At the present stage
we have to convince both. If what you are asking is: do you think
our report will have an impact? Then of course the problem is
that we shall have to wait a while. What we can say is that if
we look back at the reports which have been made previously by
the Royal Commission, and perhaps the Transport Report in 1994
is a good example, and many other reports earlier on, then although
there has often been hostility at the beginning, the impact of
our thinking has produced very significant changes in policy.
Our optimism must be based on what has happened to previous reports.
Quite a lot of our country's environmental policy has derived
from reports we have made but sometimes with a very long lead
time.
96. Some of them almost got ignored, did they
not? Are you going to campaign for this one?
(Professor Sir Tom Blundell) We certainly feel we
must campaign more strongly. We need to connect with the public
much more. We need to think of ways of communicating a rather
heavy tome or even the brief ones which I see some of you reading
here which are quite complex. We certainly have a responsibility
to seek ways we can communicate the ideas.
(Dr Owens) One of the hallmarks of our report is that
we have been able to take a very long-term view. One of the conclusions
is that we need to change the political culture, particularly
the political culture of wastefulness in the use of energy. Previous
Royal Commission reports have sometimes had major impact but they
have not always had that impact immediately. Those reports themselves
sometimes work on the way in which governments think about issues
over long periods of time. We could identify particular reports,
but I shall not. It may take time but we shall certainly work
at it.
Mr Blunt
97. What are you going to say, if you are going
to campaign on this issue, about a government which has stripped
out the key elements which would have made the Warm Homes Bill
an effective instrument for delivering one of your recommendations?
(Professor Sir Tom Blundell) We are going to press
continuously for improvements in that area. In some areas the
Government has set some courageous targets and we should certainly
want to encourage them on the way.
Chairman: What you have done this morning, Professor,
with your companions, is to set a series of very interesting puzzles,
not only for elected members but also for the population as a
whole. I also think you have identified yourself one of the real
difficulties, that on the one hand you have told us that you have
an urgent problem, and that is all of us. On the other hand you
have said that the effect of Royal Commissions is sometimes leisurely
and needs time to infiltrate. Perhaps in thanking you most warmly,
I could leave you with one message. Perhaps some of you impure
scientists ought to get off your derrieres and do a little bit
more shouting and then we might not have to rely only on taking
evidence from you in our committees. Thank you very much for coming.
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