Changing the political climate

T he scientific consensus is

clear - climate change is

occurring. Existing renew-

able energy technologies could play

a significant mitigating role, but

says Professor Tim Jackson of the

Centre for Environmental Strategy

at Surrey University, UK, the eco-

nomic and political climate will

have to change first. He tells Nina

Morgan why.

Climate change is real, it’s happening

now, and greenhouse gases produced by

human activities are significantly con-

tributing to it. Those are the scientific

conclusions reached in the latest UN

lnrergovernmenral Panel on Climate

Change (IPPC) report. The predicted

global temperature changes of between

I.5 and 4.5 degrees C could lead to

potentially catastrophic environmental

impacts - including sea level rise,

increased frequency of extreme weather

events, floods, droughts, disease migra-

tion from various places and possible

stalling of the Gulf Stream. This is why

scientists argue that climate change

42 October 2001

issues are not ones that politicians can

afford to ignore.

Blood, sweat and tears And policy makers tend co agree. Bur

reaching international agreements on

climate change policies is no trivial task.

“International negotiations on climate

change began in the late 8Os, and there

is no question that they have involved a

lot of blood, sweat and tears,” explains

Professor Tim Jackson, Professor of

Sustainable Development at the Centre

for Environmental Strategy at Surrey

University in the UK. “Although we’re

far from reaching a consensus on how

to deal with the problem, there are

some signs of progress. For example,

the science is certainly less of an obsta-

cle than it was, and it is accepted

increasingly within policy circles that

quite deep cuts in greenhouse gas emis-

sions will need ro be made by the mid-

dle to rhe end of this century. In the

UK, for example, the Royal

Commission has talked about- 60% cuts

in greenhouse gas emissions by 2050.

And, in addition, NGOs, IGOs and

others have also offered various other

suggestions about what is needed in the

longer term.”

So if the need for cuts in greenhouse

gas emissions is recognised, what’s

stopping us from implementing them?

“This,” he notes, “is a very complex

question thar involves social and polit-

ical as we11 as technological issues.”

Political science On the technological side, renewables

have an obvious role co play. “In gener-

al, there is no problem in terms of the

technical potential of renewables to

deliver energy,” notes Professor Jackson.

“And there are very, very good opportu-

nities for renewable energy technologies

REFBCC:S www.re-focus.net

to play an important role in reducing

emissions of greenhouse gases into the

atmosphere - certainly far more than

have been exploited so far.

Bur there are still technical issues to

address to cope with the incermirrency

of some renewables, particularly wind

and solar. It is generally agreed that you

can support around 30% of rhe total

generation from intermittent sources

without incurring severe penalties. But

that still leaves some way to go to meet

deep cuts in CO, emissions.”

However, the biggest problem with

relying on renewabIes to deliver the

necessary cuts in greenhouse gas emis-

sions is more to do with politics and

policy issues than with technical ones.

“The problem is not so much that the

technologies aren’t there,” he argues,

“it’s more that they aren’t there al the

right price. The single most important

step governments could take to pro-

mote and increase the use of renewables

would be to improve access for renew-

ables to the energy market. That access

ro the market would need to be under

favourable conditions and possibly

under favourable economic rates. One

move that could help - or at least justi-

fy - better market access would be to

acknowledge that there are environ-

mental costs associated with other ener-

gy supply options, and that these costs

are nor currently inrernalised within the

market price of electricity or fuels. As it

is now we are subsidising the use,

exploitation, research and development

of fossil fuels - and have been for

decades. If that policy were to change, it

could make a significant difference,

particularly if, in their place, appropri-

ate subsidies were applied to renewable

energy in recognition of environmental

benefits it offers.”

To some extent this is already hap-

pening and some progress is being

INTERVIEW

made. “For example,” he notes, “the

climate change levy in the UK, which

places an obligation on suppliers to

purchase a proportion of their electric-

ity from renewables, is one way of

encouraging investment in renewables

and helping to shift the balance away

from fossil fuels. It also establishes a

buy-out price for those who evade the

obligation and this provides a way of

encouraging finance to flow into the

renewable energy market. The propos-

als for carbon and energy taxes in

Europe, although they have been very

slow in developing and still face strong

opposition, are also mechanisms for

moving towards renewables.”

But, he cautions, “relying solely on

financial mechanisms to promote a

shift from fossil fuels to renewable ener-

gy technologies is not straightforward

because there are many social factors

involved. The coal industry, for exam-

ple, has been heavily subsidised for

decades. The removal of those subsidies

would have quite severe social implica-

tions in that it displaces and removes

the livelihoods of mining communities.

So it is a very complicated equation,

and one that requires policy making

which crosses from traditional energy

Professor Tim Jackson Professor Tim Jackson received an MA in MathematiG from Cambridge

University and a PhD in theoretical physics from St Andrews University in 1985

before going on to work as a consultant on environmental and resource issues.

Following five years at the international environmental research organisation,

The Stockholm Environment Institute, he moved to the Centre for

Environmental Strategy, at Surrey University in 1995. As Professor of Sustainable

Development, he now leads research groups on ecological economics and, in col-

laboration with Professor Roland Clift, environmental systems analysis.

Contact: tel: 01483-879072; e-mail: t.jackson@surrey.ac.uk

sector analysis, through economic and

financial issues to social issues.”

Not the whole story And in any case, Professor Jackson

argues, although renewables have an

important role to play in mitigating

climate change, they are not the whole

story. “The necessary cuts in green-

house gas emissions can’t come entire-

ly from renewable energies, at least in

the medium term,” he says. “They will

have to come from a combination of

energy efficiency, low carbon sources

and renewable energy.

“If you look at the energy equation

on a global basis, in the longer term the

issue of per capita energy consumption

becomes absolutely critical. It does not

seem conceivable that the worId could

industrialise in such a way that it con-

sumed the same amount of per capita

energy as is consumed in North

America. The stress on the ecosystem

from conventional industrial develop-

ment along the North American model

would be enormous.

“The real possibility of substituting

those polluting energy sources with

renewable energy at North American lev-

els of energy consumption would be ide-

alistic, heroic - utopian almost. Cutting

energy consumption through end-use

efficiency is absolutely essential. And this

suggests that issues of end-use consump-

tion of energy will have to come onto the

table in the foreseeable future.”