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SPA Archive
June 2006
SPATalk
Science and Peace in Antarctica
Twin tracks to tackle climate challenge
Budget throws sensitivities into relief
News in Brief
Morality,theology and action on climate change
What are we going to do about the decline in chemistry students?
The psychology of terrorism
Science meets policy
Where did texting come from?
The self-sorting tendency
Physics in the City
Young people and gambling problems
Deaf people and linguistic research
Food labelling in Europe - We need information for the majority
Food labelling in Europe - We want nutrition labelling
Food labelling in Europe - It's a mess
Mobile phones and children - Voluntary Code
Mobile phones and children - Children face risks
Mobile phones and children-UK code of practice
And then there was one
Joys and duties of a scientist
Scientists in the pay of industry
Creationism reviving; science recruitment declining
All hail the new Science Supremo
Twin tracks to tackle climate challenge
Energy and the climate dominated the political agenda this spring, as the government published a review of its Climate Change Programme and moved its Energy Review on to the next phase of consultation.
The Climate Change Programme Review met widespread derision as a result of its disclosure that the UK would miss its target of a 20 per cent reduction in CO2 emissions by 2010, instead looking likely to achieve a reduction of between 15 per cent and 18 per cent. Lord Martin Rees, President of the Royal Society, said: ‘… the Government appears to be pinning its hopes on measures that haven't delivered in the past, such as its policies on energy efficiency, which makes it difficult to have confidence that the projected emissions reductions will be delivered.’
The Green Alliance – a group of 35 organisations including renewable energy associations, green campaign groups and the Institute of Mechanical Engineers – pointed to the government’s failure to reach its target but welcomed measures to encourage household energy efficiency and the strategy for microgeneration.
‘15 per cent by 2010 would be disappointing,’ Guy Thompson, director of the Green Alliance, told S&PA. ‘The ETS (EU emissions trading scheme) decision [faced by the government later in the year] will be crucial. A tight cap will be needed for phase two if it’s to bring UK emissions down. We would also like to see the introduction of a traded emissions scheme within the UK to encourage initiatives by the retail and transport sectors, for example.’
Socio-political problems
The response from Professor Mike Hulme of the Tyndall Centre for Climate Change Research was more encouraging: ‘The government should be commended on laying out the most comprehensive policy programme on climate change of any nation state… remember, this is a serious policy programme being undertaken in an open democracy.’
These comments, he explained, were intended to point out that the UK still has leadership and credibility in this area. ‘These are deep, intractable, socio-political problems,’ he said. ‘No government can guarantee by dictat any particular reduction in emissions by any particular date.
‘The challenges are threefold: to finesse the party political system; to confront the international context; and to overcome the problem that in an open democracy, there are limits to what any government can do by way of radical leadership if they think there is a risk of rebellion,’ he said.
Energy Review
Meanwhile the government is analysing contributions from more than 500 energy and environment experts and more than 2000 written submissions to its Energy Review consultation, on which it will report by the summer. The decisions that will ensue will ‘determine energy strategy up to the middle of the 21st century,’ and will ‘underpin policy goals’, including to cut CO2 emissions, said energy minister Malcolm Wicks.
The Climate Change Programme Review is at
http://tinyurl.com/q6fy4
Vanessa Spedding is the Shorts editor
vs@mortimerpress.com