Memorandum submitted by the Tyndall Centre
for Climate Change Research (U8)
The Tyndall Centre brings together scientists,
economists, engineers and social scientists, who together are
developing sustainable responses to climate change through trans-disciplinary
research and dialogue on both a national and international level—not
just within the research community, but also with business leaders,
policy advisors, the media and the public in general.
The Tyndall Centre welcomes the opportunity
to submit evidence and would like to be kept informed of the development
of the inquiry and the committee's responses to it.
1. The forthcoming review of the UK Climate
Change Programme during 2004-05, looking particularly at what
new policies might be needed to keep the United Kingdom on track
in reducing all greenhouse gas emissions.
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
We welcome the forthcoming review of the UK
Climate Change Programme, but stress that in its current state
the Programme is seriously off course and the UK will not meet
its carbon reduction emission targets of 20% by 2020, let alone
the 60% by 2050. We suggest a significant overhaul of the Programme,
especially in the areas of transport (including aviation and freight),
renewable energy, energy efficiency, energy consumption, agriculture,
building and construction. We propose the use of Domestic Tradable
Quotas (DTQs) as a "cap and trade" scheme for greenhouse
gas emissions.
We acknowledge the key role that the UK Government
will play in 2005 as Chair of the G8 and as President of the European
Council in driving forward the Kyoto and post-Kyoto agendas. We
urge the Government to use this opportunity to re-engage the USA
and Russia in dialogue towards ratification of the Kyoto protocol.
1.1 Aviation
The Aviation White Paper, "The Future of
Air Transport", fails to give proper attention to the way
in which projected air traffic expansion will more than double
carbon dioxide emissions from UK flights by 2030, to 65-77 million
tonnes. It is clear from the White Paper that DfT expects emissions
reductions in other sectors, domestically and in Europe, to compensate
for aviation growth. However, our analysis broadly concurs with
that of the Environmental Audit Committee, raising serious doubts
about the feasibility of reconciling the Energy White Paper target
of a 60% reduction in CO2 emissions with projected
aviation growth. Neither will European Emissions Trading allow
aviation growth and effective, long-term climate change targets
to be reconciled. It is important that this is widely understood,
before excessive new airport infrastructure is constructed, and
before Government opts to explicitly exclude international aviation
from the Energy White Paper target. This would very seriously
weaken the potential effectiveness of the target and set back
policy progress. An urgent review of aviation growth projections
and infrastructure requirements in the light of raised ticket
prices is recommended.
1.1.1 European Emissions Trading
The aviation industry and DfT appear to believe
that bringing aircraft emissions within the European Emissions
Trading Scheme will allow the UK aviation industry to grow by
providing a larger market within which aviation can buy emissions
credits (ie permission to emit). However, if the aircraft emissions
of other European countries increase at rates similar to those
projected for the UK (as average medium-term Eurocontrol traffic
forecasts imply), while at the same time European countries also
contract their economy-wide CO2 emissions to meet effective
long term target climate change targets (as they must if the UK's
efforts are to have any meaningful effect), then the same problem
will arise on a European scale.
1.1.2 The scale of the problem
Our analysis of projected UK aviation emissions
relative to the Energy White Paper target shows that UK aviation
emissions in 2030 would equate to 92% of the UK's 2050 domestic
target, and 57% of a 2030 value consistent with the 2050 target.
There is every reason to believe that the aviation emissions of
other European nations would also form substantial fractions of
their emissions totals. While the Environmental Audit Committee
has used a marginally lower emissions uplift factor and has notionally
accepted DfT's claim of a 15% improvement in fuel efficiency by
2015, to give somewhat lower values (66% and 45% respectively),
the result is debatable, as the emissions uplift factor used to
account for the extra warming effects of emissions at high altitude
currently excludes cirrus effects, due to scientific uncertainty
about the extent of additional cirrus cover due to aviation. (On
average, cirrus warms the Earth by trapping reflected solar radiation.)
While it is theoretically possible that the
UK would use about half of its effective carbon budget on one
economic sector in 2030, this seems unlikely.[2]
If aviation were now brought into a European Emissions Trading
Scheme with a contracting upper cap consistent with a 2050 550ppmv-based
target, air ticket prices would rapidly rise as airlines passed
on the cost of emissions credits, and aviation demand would fall
back. However, if we allow new runways and terminals to be constructed
on the basis of demand projections that ignore the climate implications,
it will be politically difficult to prevent their use.
In terms of climate policy, there is no effective
short or medium term substitute for including UK international
aviation emissions, voluntarily allocated on a 50:50 destination/origin
split or similar, as part of the UK's energy White Paper target.
While the International Civil Aviation Organisation (ICAO) is
investigating international emissions trading for aviation, it
favours an open (multi-sector) international system, which would
take many years to agree and in the medium term would be unlikely
to be consistent with stringent climate change targets because
of the required international consensus on the targets. Domestically
and internationally, we are at a critical stage in international
climate policy. The UK cannot reconcile a near-trebling of air
passengers (by 2030) with any effective post-Kyoto climate policy.
1.2 Tyndall aviation research on a contraction
and convergence climate regime
Drawn from the 22nd report of the Royal Commission
on Environmental Pollution (RCEP), the 60% CO2 reduction
target of the Energy White paper is based on a contraction and
convergence (C&C) approach to climate policy. C&C has
increasing international support and offers a basis for an inclusive
and effective post-Kyoto climate policy regime.
C&C entails selecting a target global atmospheric
concentration of CO2 (RCEP assumed 550ppmv) and a date
by which this should be achieved (eg 2050). Emissions trajectories
that meet these conditions are then identified for all countries,
in such a way that by the target date there is per capita equity
in emissions.
Tyndall (North) researchers have assessed The
Global Commons Institute model "CCOptions", which allows
different emissions trajectories to be output as the date and
target CO2 concentration are varied. They have found
the model a useful approximation of more complex global climate
models.
The next stage is to relate the European implications
of contraction and convergence, per nation, to projected European
aviation emissions. We expect this to confirm that a European
Emissions Trading System will not resolve the clash between the
need to reduce CO2 emissions, and projected growth
in aviation.
1.3 Domestic Tradable Quotas
Domestic Tradable Quotas (DTQs) are a proposed
"cap and trade" scheme for greenhouse gas emissions
from energy use under which emissions rights are allocated to
energy end users: individuals, firms and other organizations.
A government implementing a DTQs scheme establishes the maximum
quantity of greenhouse gases that it can emit from energy use
during any given year. This carbon budget is reduced year on year
in line with nationally and internationally agreed emissions reduction
targets.
Each carbon budget is divided into carbon units,
with, for example, 1 carbon unit representing 1 kg of carbon dioxide.
A proportion of these units is allocated, free and on an equal
per capita basis, to all adult individuals.[3]
Under the original DTQs proposal carbon units were allocated to
firms and other organizations through a government-regulated auction.
Whilst in our view, auction of rights is the preferable method
of allocation, allocation by grandfathering[4]
would be necessary for the DTQs proposal to be compatible with
the EU emissions trading scheme.
All fuels and electricity are assigned a carbon
rating based on the quantity of greenhouse gases (measured in
carbon units) emitted by the combustion of a unit of each fuel
and by the generation of a unit of electricity. When citizens
and organizations purchase fuel or electricity, they surrender
the number of carbon units corresponding to their purchase to
the retailer. For accounting purposes, these units are passed
up the supply chain and on reaching the primary energy producer
are surrendered back to government. There is a national market
in carbon units in which individuals and organisations with surplus
units may offer them for sale to those wishing to purchase additional
units.
Central to the DTQ scheme is a computer database
in which the carbon unit account for all citizens and organisations
is held, and in which all carbon unit transactions, be they issuing,
surrendering, buying or selling, are recorded. All transactions
are conducted electronically. For example, a customer purchasing
petrol would simply have their "smart card" swiped by
the petrol station attendant, thereby transferring the relevant
number of carbon units from their carbon unit account to that
of the company owning the petrol station. For those purchasers
of fuel and electricity without carbon units to surrender at the
point of sale—for example, foreign visitors and individuals
who have used all their units—the relevant number of carbon
units are simply purchased electronically on the national market
by the fuel or electricity seller on behalf of the purchaser.
The purchaser then pays the seller for these units and surrenders
them in the usual manner.
1.4 Technology policy
The UK's renewables policies, are fundamentally
inadequate to realise the very large investments required in new,
low Carbon energy technologies and energy efficiency programmes
that are necessary to meet the 60% reduction target. There is
no indication of a large scale adoption of distributed CHP, or
of solar power, or of energy efficiency measures. The wind energy
programme is gaining pace, but is still not of a scale to meet
the UK's intermediate goals of 10% reduction by 2010 and 20% by
2020.
It should be emphasised that in the area of
energy demand and supply, together with energy efficiency measures,
the technologies required are already available. The policy problem
is to persuade, and to provide regulations and economic incentives
to industry and households to take up these technologies on a
mass scale. The construction industry is a particular problem;
50% of GHGs come from buildings, but the UK continues to build
houses and offices that are of a low standard in terms of energy
use and energy efficiency.
It is imperative that the UK government and
other governments provide massive support for "clean"
energy technologies, without which GHG stabilisation at acceptable
levels will be impossible. The incorporation into new homes and
other buildings of micro heat and power generation systems based
on a combination of solar, wind and other sources should be made
mandatory. Market and regulatory/tax mechanisms should be introduced
to encourage individuals and businesses to take more responsibility
for energy efficiency. This will be more successful if it is based
on "positive" incentives to reduce energy use (eg tax
reductions for efficiency) rather than negative, punitive policies
that add additional tax burdens to individual households and businesses.
Grants should be available that cover the full installation costs
of domestic micro-power systems, rather than a proportion of the
cost as is currently the case.
Motor vehicles are continuing to increase GHG
emissions at a rapid rate. The growth in road transport far exceeds
the projected increases in efficiency for conventional petrol
and diesel powered vehicles. Therefore, stronger policies are
required to encourage low-carbon power systems, such as petrol/battery
hybrids or fuel cell vehicles. Patterns of settlement, work, leisure
and transport should be examined—the current growth of private
car use, for example, is unsustainable. Transport policies should
reduce dependence on private car use by improving public transport.
Issues of transport associated with the distance between homes
and work places should also be examined. Could future planning
reduce the distances people travel between home and work by rethinking
urban development?
Commercial, particularly food, distribution,
is another area where emissions could be reduced. Many foodstuffs
are transported to distribution and food processing centres before
being redistributed to point-of-sale outlets closer to the original
sources. Incentives for a more decentralised and efficient distribution
system that reduces "food miles" could reduce GHG emissions
and possibly also traffic congestion. Greater emphasis on local
food production, compatible with current social trends towards
the consumption of local, often organic, produce, could improve
efficiency of national food production systems.
1.5 Agriculture and land use
Agriculture is an important emitter of carbon.
Exposure of soil organic matter through ploughing and soil erosion
causes mineralization of soil organic carbon (SOC). In fact it
is thought to have contributed the equivalent to about a third
of the increase in the atmospheric C pool since 1850, making it
a significant driver of climate change.
It is thought that about 75% of this could be
sequestered back through improved management practices in agriculture.
These practices could also improve soil structure, decreasing
runoff and improve water infiltration; this will both improve
water availability and reduce the risk of flooding. Both are helpful
adaptation, as well as mitigation, strategies, both in the United
Kingdom and elsewhere.
Under the Kyoto Protocol, the significance of
agriculture as a carbon sink is implicit in Article 3.4 (additional
land use, land use change, and forestry activities). Moreover
some trading of emissions credits from agriculture has already
begun outside the Kyoto framework, particularly in the United
States. The importance of agriculture as a carbon sink is widely
recognised.
However, current agricultural and trade policy
in the EU conspires to encourage emissions from agriculture.
1.5.1 Subsidised agriculture and climate change
The UK has argued strongly for reform of the
EU's Common Agricultural Policy (CAP). But it needs to redouble
its efforts.
Producer subsidies can encourage unsustainable
practices such as monocropping of cereals, which increases runoff
and erosion; it can also deplete organic matter, which compounds
this by damaging the soil structure. Over the last 20 years or
so, agricultural soils in the European Union have lost organic
matter at a rate that has serious implications for productivity
as well as climate change. In England and Wales, the percentage
of soils with less than 3.6% organic matter content rose from
35% to 42% between 1980 and 1995 (European Commission, 2000).
This causes water to run off rather than pass through the soil
to the crop's root zone, and further exacerbates flooding risk,
both locally and on a broader scale. There is evidence of such
deteriorating soil structure in Britain (DEFRA, 2002).
1.5.2 Flooding and erosion
In the South Downs, there were 60 incidents
of flooding of property caused by runoff from agricultural land
between 1976 and 1993. There may be insufficient appreciation
of the link between such runoff and the major flooding in South-East
England in 2000 (ibid). Retention and sequestration of carbon
in agriculture is therefore highly synergistic with other environmental
goals including flood protection, pollution control (from agricultural
chemicals) and agricultural productivity. Reform of the Common
Agricultural Policy (CAP) is an important first step towards realising
this potential.
Meanwhile, similar erosion is taking place in
Southern Europe for the opposite reason—because farmers
are trying to take advantage of subsidies by packing as many olive
trees onto their land as possible—as much as 80 million
MT of soil are lost from olive groves in Andalusia alone (Pohl,
2001). EU policy is therefore causing soil erosion in both member
states and developing countries.
When soil is eroded by wind or water, the organic
matter in it—which is largely composed of organic carbon—is
exposed to the air and mineralises. The organic carbon is thus
converted to CO2. The annual increase in the atmospheric
carbon pool is about 3.3 Pg C a year (IPCC, 2001). So soil erosion
may be responsible for about a third of the GHGs emitted.[5]
1.5.3 How can the UK help?
The UK can press for removal of all subsidies
that have perverse outcomes, not just export subsidies. But second,
it can advocate a change in emphasis from producer subsidies to
payment for environmental services, such as offering farmers a
viable price for a carbon "crop". Farmers in Britain
would be well-placed to sequester carbon, as the levels of soil
organic matter are potentially higher in less arid environments.
The CAP should be reformed by diverting agricultural
subsidies from production support to payment for environmental
services. Britain should lead the way in this, through:
— Appropriate modification and administration
of set-aside.
— Advocating the switching of resources
from producer support to better management practices.
— Building a framework through which
farmers can certify and perhaps trade emissions credits earned
from sustainable management practices.
— Through better management practices
(BMPs) on land that remains in production, to increase soil organic
matter and thus carbon, and improve soil structure (reducing runoff
and therefore erodibility and flood risk).
The former could include tying set-aside specifically
to carbon sequestration. This would prevent farmers from moving
set-aside around their farms, enabling reversion to grassland
or woody encroachment—both important sequestration processes.
Given that carbon is likely to have a growing cash value as countries
work to meet their Kyoto commitments, there may even be net gains
from using set-aside payments for this purpose.
BMPs could also include biofuels production.
It has recently been argued that if 10% of Europe's agricultural
land were managed for biofuels in combination with woodland regeneration,
the reduction in emissions would equal the EU's entire Kyoto commitment
(Pretty et al, 2003). Biofuels should be approached with caution;
their economics of biofuels are contested (Gielen et al, 2002),
and it is not yet clear how much energy they could really provide.
There could also be perverse effects (see for example the UKPIA's
evidence to the Committee, 31 March 2003—although this is
scarcely neutral; see also sections 14-44 of the Committee's 17th
Report, 29 October 2003). Displacement of food production could
also have unpredictable effects. But there is potential.
2. THE
ROLE THAT
THE GOVERNMENT
WILL PLAY
IN 2005 AS
CHAIR OF
THE G8 AND
AS PRESIDENT
OF THE
EUROPEAN COUNCIL
IN DRIVING
FORWARD THE
KYOTO AND
POST-KYOTO
AGENDAS
Formal negotiations will start on a second commitment
period at the SBSSTA (Subsidiary Body for Technical, Technological
and Scientific Advice), a subsidiary body of the IPCC (Intergovernmental
Panel on Climate Change) in 2005. We believe that Tony Blair and
the UK Government have an historic opportunity to provide global
leadership on these key issues, and present both Russia and the
USA with the undisputable case for ratification of the Kyoto Protocol
and establish the path towards a post Kyoto framework.
The priority should be to ensure that the UK
plays a constructive role in the negotiations and that crucially,
it injects creative and far-sighted suggestions for an architecture
that would genuinely address the concerns of developing countries,
and as far as possible the concerns of the US and others who have
not yet ratified.
It is also important at this time to take bold
action on the adoption of a target for stabilisation (the ultimate
objective of the convention)—the UK has an adopted target
of a 2ºC temperature rise. The UK should adopt this target
(or a similar concentration-based target of 450-550 ppm) and make
it clear that this is what the international climate regime should
be trying to achieve.
Recently there have been signs of a debate within
Europe over the burden of economic costs of meeting emission reduction
commitments. Here the committee should be aware of the following:
A key intellectual debate in the academic community
is the question of just how much emissions reductions will cost,
and whether current economic and Integrated Assessment Models[6]
predict excessively high estimates of the long-term costs of GHG
mitigation. Recent advances in the field of technology modelling
and technology policy suggest that when models attempt to fully
incorporate eg the fact that a new low-carbon energy technology
may become much cheaper as its uptake increases, the predicted
costs of mitigation can decrease drastically. Hence, this active
area of academic research should be properly incorporated into
the political discourse on what is possible both within Europe
and in a second commitment period.
We believe that there were too many compromises
made to the EU Renewables Directive for member state interest
(Eg UK's non binding target of 10% by 2010). The UK should ensure
that frameworks are established to allow renewables targets to
be compatible with climate policy. We need to examine what mix
of renewable energy and technological innovation is needed to
reach emission reductions post 2010 under various policy scenarios.
The Tyndall centre is actively researching in this area.
Various attempts are being made to engage with
eg Russia on diplomatic and scientific levels over the issue of
climate change. Areas where efforts can be maintained include
to: to encourage constructive engagement between UK and EU scientists
and scientists from countries who have not yet ratified; for the
UK to send out a very strong signal that it will meet its commitments
under the protocol whether it actually enters into force or not.
In terms of the US, the UK's current approach of building bridges
where possible is appropriate.
There are many proposals on the table but it
seems likely that the way forward must be through differentiated
categories of commitments, where eg: (most) developed countries
signed up to quantitative emission reduction targets; a second
group of countries sign up to carbon-intensity based targets;
and a third group of countries (mainly the official Least Developed
Countries) don't make any emission reduction commitment but have
adequate access to compensation funds (for adaptation to the negative
impacts of climate change for example).
Serious pressure, including trade sanctions,
should be put on countries that refuse to ratify the Kyoto protocol
and future agreements to limit GHG emissions until they do so.
The UK needs to play a role in finding a way forward on a workable
architecture. This might be a leadership role or it might also
be to play a constructive role in supporting an emerging developing
country-led proposal, as in the case of the UKOverseas Territories
(UKOT's). These are small low-lying island states, particularly
at risk from the impacts of climate change. The UKOT's have fallen
through the gap (FCO-DFID-CPACC) in terms of preparedness for
climate change. Also they do not receive any of the adaptation
funds available to other countries as they are UK territories.
CPACC[7]
does not extend to the UKOT's and FCO-DFID have not organised
between themselves who is responsible to pay for the extension
of the CPACC lessons to the OT's. The territories would like to
extend the convention to their islands, but are unsure about their
obligations to mitigate if it is extended.
The UK might also learn from the experience
of allocating commitments within the EU—there is in effect
a North-South divide within Europe, and the agreed allocation
of GHG emission reduction commitments cannot be separated from
the massive amounts of finance that has been put into eg the Cohesion
Funds (for Spain, Portugal, Greece and Ireland).
2.1 Adaptation: high impact policy
The types of adaptations that will enable the
UK and other countries to confront climate change will vary considerably
across geographic regions, economic activities and population
groups. This "context specificity" means that adaptation
is more likely to be successful if strategies are developed at
the local level. The role of central government should therefore
be to encourage meaningful, inclusive, devolved decision-making,
and provide what support it can for local initiatives.
Adaptation and mitigation are intimately linked—the
less emphasis is placed on mitigation, the more difficult adaptation
will be. Adaptation may be impossible in the face of rapid and
large-magnitude climate change associated with rapid increases
in atmospheric GHG emissions.
Policies should recognise that adaptation is
often reactive and somewhat ad hoc in nature—it is much
easier to ensure mitigation through policy than to guarantee adaptation;
mitigation is ultimately a technical issue (issues such as market
penetration notwithstanding), whereas adaptation is much more
of a behavioural one. Adaptation can be pursued through vulnerability
reduction based on the mapping of climate hazards and social vulnerability
to identify "hotspots" of high climate risk. Assessments
of climate hazard based for example on a combination of future
climate projections and assessments of local geographical factors
(topography, geomorphology etc) could be incorporated into the
planning process, identifying potentially high risk areas where
industry, infrastructure and settlements might be particular exposed
to the physical manifestations of future climate change (eg flooding,
high winds, drought-induced subsidence etc).
30 September 2004
2 It will be even less plausible if the atmospheric
concentration of carbon dioxide assumed to be safe by the Royal
commission on Environmental Pollution and hence DTI in the Energy
White Paper (550 parts per million) turns out to be too high to
avoid dangerous climate change, which may be the case. Back
3
This would be equal to the proportion of total emissions from
energy use resulting from citizens' direct purchase of fuel and
electricity (in the UK around 40%) over a nominated period prior
to the introduction of the scheme. Back
4
Where each emission permit is based on the levels of emissions
prior to scheme inception. Back
5
Of course not all soil erosion is anthropogenic-that is, the
result of human activity. On the other hand, the estimates given
here assume that only about 20% of the organic matter translocated
by soil erosion is mineralised; another estimate puts it at around
70% (Lal, 2003; Jacinthe and Lal, 2001). The extent to which anthropogenic
soil erosion contributes to climate change is hard to quantify,
but it is reasonable to assume that it has a significant impact. Back
6
For more information on Tyndall's IAM, see: http://www.tyndall.ac.uk/research/theme1/summary_it1_31.shtml Back
7
http://www.cpacc.org/ Caribbean Planning for Adaptation to Climate
Change Back
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