Political Climate

Before we start, it’s important to make two things very clear. First, Political Climate thinks that building new coal-fired power stations without emissions abatement is unwise on climate grounds. Second, we think subsidies for the capital costs of new electricity generation should now be focussed on renewables. But, as the unfolding debate concerning the building by Eskom of a massive coal power plant at Lephalale in South Africa’s Limpopo Province illustrates, simply holding such views is not enough.

The plant (the above picture is its construction site) has been named ‘Medupi’ by state-owned Eskom. This apparently means ‘rain that soaks parched lands’ – perhaps unfortunate given the climate impacts of coal. At 4,788 MW of installed generating capacity, Medupi will be an absolute monster; reportedly the fourth largest coal plant in the world. Continue reading →

2-3 million litres of oil a day are now gushing out of the ruptured pipe at the base of the BP platform in the Gulf of Mexico, and it could get worse before a solution is found. Attempts so far to stem the flow have failed, and oil slicks are now threatening beaches in Louisiana. The volume far exceeds the US’s worst previous oil spill – the 1989 Exxon Valdez disaster in Alaska, but the impact of the Gulf spill will not be just about how much hits the beaches. For this disaster is not in a distant state beyond Canada, but very visibly right in America’s backyard. The Gulf fishing industry is already hit hard – if storms push the spill towards Florida’s coast, a $60 billion a year tourism industry is not going to be happy.

But what is really striking about the Gulf disaster is Continue reading →

So EC climate commissioner Connie Hedegaard today finally published a paper backing away from a proposal that Europe commit itself to a 30% reduction in emissions by 2020 (despite rumours to the contary on the front page of The Times, subsequently taken to task by George Monbiot!).

The economic slump since 2008 means that the existing 20% target now looks a lot easier and cheaper to achieve. The financial crisis also took the steam out of the EU ETS carbon market. With Greece in fiscal meltdown and austerity measures under way in Spain, Portugal and now the UK, Europe may well see a serious double dip recession, making even a 30% target much less scary than it seems. A shift up to 30% would also have resuscitated the carbon market. But of course there has been resistance, not least from Germany and eastern Europe, but also the Confederation of British Industry here in the UK. All of this is a reminder of how politically difficult a direct target-led approach is.

On the face of it, this looks like a real blow for those who think Europe should try to rescue its global climate leadership in the wake of the Copehagen fiasco. However, Continue reading →

Hi all – we went away for a little while there, due to various pressures at work and home. But expect to see postings much more frequently on Political Climate from now on. Coming up:

• The limits to environmentalism Part 3 – we review Tim Jackson’s Prosperity without Growth
• A Tale of Two Milibands
• Why we need a low-carbon version of fair trade
• The case for more public borrowing (are these guys crazy!?) for low carbon investments

We’ll also start looking more seriously at what the new coalition government is going to do. Later today we’ll blog on the will-they-won’t-they story of the European 30% emissions reduction target.

A few days ago Duncan Green from Oxfam posted a thoughtful review of a thoughtful book – Why We Disagree About Climate Change published last year by Mike Hulme, a climate modeller from the University of East Anglia. At the core of the book is the idea that climate change will bring about a transformation in human life that is far more profound than most people realise, certainly those with their eyes down on the immediacy of policy. Duncan’s review picks up on a quote from the book and goes to on interpret that quote: Continue reading →

We’ve mentioned before the polling the Institute for Public Policy Research did last year with Brand Democracy, testing out different ways of framing climate policies in 157 marginal constituencies across Britain. Over 3,000 people on YouGov’s panel were surveyed on-line, and the data then weighted by social, demographic and voting patterns. The fieldwork was carried out in September ahead of the party conference season.

A few key results stand out. Continue reading →

India and China are so often mentioned in the same breath, especially in climate change negotiations. Prior to Copenhagen, they joined up with Brazil and South Africa to form the BASIC grouping. But many in Delhi are asking a two-pronged question about BASIC; ‘does it serve India’s interests’ and ‘for how long’?

In some respects BASIC is an evolutionary beast whose ancestors were the G90 and G20 that mated during the Doha round of World Trade Organisation talks and ultimately brought them to a grinding hault. Like the ‘G110’, as it became known during the WTO’s 2005 ministerial meeting in Hong Kong, BASIC is also a blocking constituency. However, it differs from the G110 in the rather obvious respect of being a much smaller group of large, developing world economies and is also Sino-centric; the G110 was not. Continue reading →