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Lord Greaves: My Lords, I, too, congratulate the noble Lord, Lord Renton, and his committee on an interesting and readable report. I welcome the noble Lord, Lord Haworth, to the House to join the small number of mountaineers here. If the trend goes on, we may even get a trip up some time.
I want to take a fairly broad-brush view across the geosciences, although I am conscious that what I am going to try to say in five minutes is what I would have regaled my old A-level students with over a couple of 45-minute periods. I will rush and be broad brush, and I probably will not achieve it anyhow.
The conventional wisdom of all the geophysical sciences comes from two famous geologists from the 18th and 19th centuries, James Hutton and Sir Charles Lyell. They founded the doctrine of uniformitarianism—which, in itself, will have taken me about half a minute to say—based on Hutton's famous slogan:
Current geological processes, occurring at the same rates observed today, and in the same manner, account for all of the Earth's geological features.
The doctrine of gradualism came to replace the biblical doctrine of diluvianism—that it all occurred during the flood when Noah sailed his Ark. Since the noble Lord, Lord Renton, invited us all to remember that time—although even your Lordships' House does not go back quite so far—I have a vision of the noble Lord sailing his new ark up Lewes high street the next time his local town floods, when I think we should all come and join in. That doctrine effectively prevailed for the best part of 150 years, and most other geophysical sciences joined in it. Within biology, there was Charles Darwin's concept of evolution—the idea that lots of little things happening over a long period of time resulted in where we are, and that we can observe those processes happening now. In the science of land forms, or geomorphology, noble Lords who did A-level geography probably remember the "cycle of erosion". It was probably taught to all as being a fact, but it is really a highly flawed model. I think people now understand that about the work of William Morris Davis.
The alternative to gradualism was thought to be catastrophism—the idea that many of the Earth's features formed as a result of past cataclysmic activity. These are what we now call "natural disasters"—and the fact that we do so is interesting, since that is a human way of looking at them. It is revealing that, as human beings, we say these are disasters—whereas, in practice, the geological, climatological, geomorphological and evolutionary records are actually full of catastrophes, cataclysms and so on. The biblical flood almost certainly occurred; there is much evidence of a major flood between 3000–2000 BC, and lots of geological evidence of major floods in the past. That is something to which we should pay great attention, since we are talking about climatic change that might result in the melting of lots of land ice.
The complacency which has come from these scientific views has infected everybody, but this extreme gradualism is now being questioned. It is clear that catastrophic or cataclysmic events have played a normal part in geological, geomorphological, climatic, oceanographic and evolutionary history over the years. The important thing for us as human beings is that for the last few thousand years it has been a period of remarkable stability and calm. Civilisation as we know it has been built upon that stability—with systems of agriculture and the development of stable, sedentary communities who were not just wandering around chasing animals. The material culture, as anthropologists call it, associated with those societies—advanced social systems, civic society, democracy and all its associated freedoms that we as individuals regard as so important—depends upon a degree of stability within the natural environment in which we live. If that stability comes to an end and we enter a period of cataclysmic change, we are obviously put at risk.
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At the moment we have crises which are not of climatic or natural origin—such as the alleged threat from terrorists, where we are being told that some of our basic liberties have to be curtailed because of that threat. Just imagine the situation if the climate of our globe and all its associated systems gets completely out of control, and we have to cope with that. There is a real danger here that catastrophes are going to occur—as they have over geological and geomorphological time. After all, most of this country was covered in ice only 100,000 years ago. The last ice only left the British Isles 10,000 years ago. There have been huge, catastrophic changes in the past. We cannot assume that those changes are not going to occur again. Whether they are occurring because of anthropogenic causes, whether we are the cause of it by churning all this carbon dioxide, methane and so on into the atmosphere, or whether they are occurring for other reasons, or whether it is a mixture of the two in a sense does not matter, because we must learn to cope with it and to live with it. If the worst fears come about—the melting of the west Antarctic ice mass or sufficient melting in Greenland to cock up totally the Gulf Stream—there will be huge changes to come to terms with.
The sceptics on climatic change seem to come in two groups. There are those represented by people such as Dr David Bellamy, who seem to be in denial. Some people are in denial. Then there are those such as professor Bjorn Lomborg, who has had a lot of publicity recently, who are saying, "Yes, it may well be happening; it could happen and perhaps it is definitely happening; but we cannot do anything about it. Therefore we should put all our investment into countering the effects of it". The revolution that is occurring in the geosciences needs to transfer itself to a revolution of thought within the public polity generally—within debate and the decisions that governments make and the way in which we all look at these things. We have to do both. We cannot assume that we are capable of stopping this climatic change, although we must try to stop it. We must do the kind of things that Dr Lomborg is suggesting, as well as trying to stop it. We should not allow the debate to become oppositional. We must say, "Yes, there will be a lot of changes, and there may be catastrophic, cataclysmic changes. We must find a way of coming to terms with them without destroying the very civilisation of which we are part".
Baroness Young of Old Scone: My Lords, I am pleased to be able to be here to talk about this welcome, solid and practical report from the committee. I commend the noble Lord, Lord Renton of Mount Harry, and his committee members on producing it.
I should declare an interest as the chief executive of the Environment Agency. I also thank the noble Lord, Lord Renton of Mount Harry, for an opportunity that I did not think I would have when I came here tonight. That was the opportunity to hear the noble Duke, the Duke of Montrose, confess to owning only a small Munro. I shall treasure that concept.
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I also add my congratulations to the noble Lord, Lord Haworth, on his excellent maiden speech. I found his account of his personal experience of glaciers melting quite moving. I must admit that, perhaps not in the spirit of responding to maiden speeches, I disagree with him on his call for the resumption of the nuclear programme. In my capacity as being responsible for the management of nuclear waste, I am only too aware that many issues in nuclear waste management are still to be resolved. The most compelling argument for not prematurely re-opening the nuclear programme is that it would simply knock the feet out from any hope of investment in renewable technologies in the future.
It is clear that this report tackled some live issues. That is particularly so because even in the period since it was produced there have been a number of substantial developments. The recent 2005 stabilisation conference at the Hadley Centre made it even more important that we tackle climate change with urgency. The basic message from that conference was that if we see climate change or temperate increases of between one and three degrees, we have a considerably increased risk of damage. If we see anything above three degrees, we will experience large-scale, irreversible system disruption like turning off the Gulf Stream or the destabilisation of the Antarctic ice sheets. Those would be serious and irreversible. We are talking about temperature ranges well within the climate change projections for the next century having those sorts of impacts. It is a serious matter.
There has also always been a considerable debate about the costs of stabilising temperature. The stabilisation conference clearly demonstrated that the costs of actions to stabilise temperature are usually over-estimated, and the costs of not acting are often under-estimated. The stabilisation conference showed that stabilisation is manageable with a portfolio of actions that reduces or manages emissions, provided that it is also aimed at reducing the costs of the actions.
The big problem with the whole threat of climate change is not the economic issues associated with climate change reduction measures, but the political, social and behavioural barriers to implementing mitigation actions. The UK is in a unique position to grapple with some of those issues through its leadership in the presidencies of the G8 and the EU. I commend the Prime Minister's commitment to make climate change a central part of the presidencies.
Globally, there may be a real opportunity to take a different route in international relationships on climate change. There is considerable potential for a partnership between the European Union and China. At the moment, China is planning to introduce treble figures of coal-fired power stations over the next 25 years. An EU-China partnership would seek development of cleaner technologies, light renewables, and energy-efficiency technologies in high standards for vehicles and fuels. It could be a very potent trade and development partnership, bringing together the two big markets of emerging China and the European Union. If that did happen—if our presidency of the G8 could bring that about—the US would have to take notice, and we might find a way to bring the US into a
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much more productive relationship on climate change, through an economic route rather than trying to persuade it through science or moral arguments.
Many speakers have already talked about some of the challenges of the presidency of the European Union. The European Emissions Trading Scheme is one of the big opportunities. We need to make sure that, at the second stage, we see tighter caps for the scheme to ensure substantial CO2 reductions and the development of new technologies. We certainly have to bring aviation into the emissions trading scheme.
Alas, the Prime Minister in the UK can show leadership in the European Union and globally only if there is a solid basis of performance back here at home. Perhaps we could tempt the Minister into telling us how the Government plan to come back from the rather embarrassing debacle of the attempt to raise the national allocation plan under the emissions trading scheme. That threatened to damage the leadership of the presidencies. We simply have to buckle down and accept the national emissions programme. It is a poor pass if industry cannot use its ingenuity and innovation to find ways to rise to that challenge, as it will undoubtedly have to rise to a further challenge if we are to move beyond the 2012 targets to the 60 per cent reduction signalled for 2050.
Back home, we need to see: progress on packages of measures to reverse the 62 per cent increase in carbon dioxide from the growth in vehicle use; more support for domestic energy efficiency, including faster movement on the likes of building regulations and the sustainable buildings code; and increased support for business in its energy-efficiency efforts. It is perfectly possible to see a further 20 per cent in energy efficiency from business over the next few years if we get the right sorts of policy in place. There is a major global opportunity this very year for the UK and Europe, but it needs demonstrable effort and solid performance here at home.
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