The UK’s Committee on Climate Change (CCC) has called on the government to target net zero greenhouse gas emissions by 2050 with a raft of ambitious new policies.
According to the CCC report, the goal can be reached using existing technologies and within acceptable economic costs outlined in the Climate Change Act of 2008. However, significant changes to the energy system, land use and people’s lifestyles will be required. Low-carbon electricity generation will need to increase four-fold, new combustion vehicles should not be available beyond 2035, large amounts of trees must be planted, and emerging technologies such as carbon capture and hydrogen energy will need to be implemented.
For net zero emissions to be reached by the middle of the century, the government must act immediately to introduce these policies and more, the report claims. The CCC estimates that the cost of the transition will be 1-2 per cent of GDP per annum until 2050, comparable to the figure the UK spends on defence each year. That cost should be shared fairly by business and consumers, and the public will need to be engaged in order for the ambitious policies to be successful.
“We can all see that the climate is changing and it needs a serious response,” said Lord Deben, chairman of the CCC. “The great news is that it is not only possible for the UK to play its full part – we explain how in our new report – but it can be done within the cost envelope that Parliament has already accepted. The government should accept the recommendations and set about making the changes needed to deliver them without delay.”
The CCC says that achieving net zero by 2050 would be in line with the UK’s commitments under the Paris Agreement of 2015, which aims to keep man-made global temperature increases at least below 2°C and ideally below 1.5°C. Global average temperature has already risen by 1°C from pre-industrial levels.
The effects of this warming are becoming increasingly manifest, from extreme weather events to the diminishing polar ice caps. While the CCC’s report has been broadly welcomed by the scientific community, some academics have criticised it for not going far enough, particularly in consideration of the UK’s historical emissions and overall contribution to climate change.
“It is welcome news that the Climate Change Committee has recommended a target date for the UK to achieve net-zero emissions of greenhouse gases,” said Dr Phil Williamson, Honorary Reader at the University of East Anglia’s School of Environmental Sciences.
“Yet it is also disappointing that 2050 is no earlier than the global date necessary to limit warming to 1.5 degrees C. The UK’s current share of global emissions may be relatively small, at around 1 per cent; however, we are in the top five nations with regard to historical responsibilities for creating the climate change problem, and we have now outsourced much of our carbon-intensive manufacturing to other countries.
“Is this really the ‘highest possible ambition’, as stated in the report? More rapid progress would increase costs in some sectors, yet it would also provide additional economic opportunities; for example, in developing technologies for greenhouse gas removal.”
Our concern is that there is a growing opinion that ‘electrification’ and battery bulk storage is the principal answer to produce a net zero-carbon future. However, batteries are really horrible toxic things with very many disadvantages which could seriously affect the sustainability of the planet, perhaps as much as increased CO2.
My university-level students believe that standardized flywheels offer the best solution to the essential global bulk energy storage problem and they are an attractive option for mass development, production and marketing. Their designs are different from most engineering teams’ currently developing flywheel storage systems – who all seem to be concentrating on lower radius of gyration (k) but higher rotational velocities ((w) – typically >20,000RPM). However, the storage capacity of a flywheel is directly proportional to k^2 AND w^2 but there are many engineering benefits in increasing the radius of gyration (k) rather than the rotational velocity: less engineering challenge and bearing demands, better motor/generator configuration compatibility with energy extraction characteristics: and the potential avoidance of transonic effects (so less need to maintain vacuum environments) are examples of a few of these benefits. My students’ designs now require further development to optimize: the unit design, the flywheel enclosure and bearings, motor-generator configurations and inverter/rectifier and connection packages. It is hoped that the UK will take the lead in this development and give the required financial backing to build and test the prototypes and expertise to see the concepts through to production, marketing and installment around the world.
Hi Richard – interesting comments. Any links to your research, please?
I am pleased to see that the above answer is focusing on NEW INNOVATION, as the answers to climate change will come from new innovation. The real issue is how to fun new innovation, investors are not willing to fun new ideas, and governments are equally shy. Both want proven answers before they should invest, the result is real innovation does not happen. We only need look at what has happened in the last 10 -15 years, the changes in new technologies has been impressive, yet some of the things we take for granted today where not even around 10 – 15 years ago. Funding must be provided to individual inventors, not just the top end of town, the process has forgotten about the innovation process, it starts with an inventor, not a large multinational company.
The other day I happened to be looking at data on what fraction of countries’ electricity was generated from renewables. There’s food for thought. Several countries (such as Albania) stand at 100% renewable, thanks to hydro-electric power. Imagine if your country had 100% renewable electricity – not just offset but really 100% renewable. And with power to spare so you could power cars and heating from that source. Imagine!
The CCC report is asking the UK to stop its current 0.5 Gt/a carbon dioxide emissions at an estimated cost of £ 50 b/y (almost certainly an underestimate given the unproven / partly developed technologies required).
The rest of the world, principally China and India, are currently increasing their CO2 output at approximately 1 Gt/a (as CO2). So the UK’s potential effect is negligibly small.
This proposal is surely not an acceptable use of the UK’s financial-resources, especially given the poverty and hospital budget shortfalls etc that we can see all around us.
The CCC (led by Lord Gummer) and the ECIU (led by Richard Black) and Chief Advisor to the government on sustainable energy, Dieter Helm, all like to claim that the UK is very clever and has cut emissions by 70% since 1990, especially for electricity generation, by transitioning to low carbon sources. However the numbers are just fudged as they exclude globalisation with the UK moving much of its intensive carbon manufacturing processes overseas. Coupled with increases in population, globalisation, transport and air traffic, emissions have actually risen since 1990, rather than the claimed 70% reduction due to RE sources. In addition, diffuse intermittent RE sources are not the answer to reducing emissions or large dense populations. The transition to using lots of diffuse RE sources is shown to be severely flawed by the failed energy transition project in Germany, which has led to increased electricity costs, increased fuel poverty and no real reductions in emissions!
For the real problems and some of the solutions, see http://www.environmentalprogress.org
I agree with most of your points, the CCA has, rightly, been described as the biggest ever act of damage. The emissions figures are a game in which the emissions of Drax are discounted as they are wood based: a massive fraud on the UK in terms of data and cost, and the increase imports are not counted as a penalty. The 3 countries with the highest RE in Europe are Denmark, Germany and the UK; the highest power costs in Europe follow the same line.