UNFCCC Bonn conference – June 2011. (Image by: Adopt a Negotiator)

The UN Climate Change Conference kicks off this week in Bonn, Germany as governments continue framework discussions in preparation for the Seventeenth Conference of Parties (COP17) to be held in Durban, South Africa, at the end of the year. Over three thousand participants representing 183 countries are attending the conference in Bonn from June 6-17, including government delegates, business and industry representatives, environmental organizations, and research bodies.

Speaking on the first day of the conference, UNFCCC Executive Secretary Christiana Figueres reminded governments that they hold an unavoidable responsibility to make clear progress towards the 2011 climate objectives agreed to at COP16 in Cancun.

“Governments lit a beacon in Cancun towards a low-emission world which is resilient to climate change. They committed themselves to a maximum global average temperature rise of 2 degrees Celsius, with further consideration of a 1.5 degree maximum. Now, more than ever, it is critical that all efforts are mobilized towards living up to this commitment.”

Ms. Figueres expects that the meeting in Bonn should provide clarity on the architecture of the future international climate change regime to reduce global emissions. In addition, negotiators will focus on the design of the finance, technology and adaptation institutions agreed to in Cancun which will allow developing countries to successfully adapt to climate change while still building their own sustainable futures.

The conference comes amid a backdrop of new warnings from the International Energy Agency (IEA) of a sharp rise in the volume and concentration of greenhouse gas emissions in the atmosphere. The IEA announced last week that 2010 emissions from global energy generation have returned to record highs, marking an unexpectedly sharp rebound from the reduced emission levels caused by the financial crisis. Reports now show that carbon dioxide concentrations have once again peaked at just under 395 parts per million (ppm).

The two week conference includes the thirty-fourth sessions of the Subsidiary Body for Scientific and Technological Advice (SBSTA 34) and the Subsidiary Body for Implementation (SBI 34), the sixteenth session of the Ad Hoc Working Group on Further Commitments for Annex I Parties under the Kyoto Protocol (AWG-KP 16), and the fourteenth session of the Ad Hoc Working Group on Long-term Cooperative Action under the Convention (AWG-LCA 14).

New items under discussion include: SBI’s consideration of proposed items on work programmes relating to reporting by Annex I and non-Annex I countries, adaptation, and response measures, as well as SBSTA’s consideration of the work programme on agriculture, the impacts of climate change on water and water resource management, and the initiation of a new work programme on issues regarding reducing emissions from deforestation and forest degradation in developing countries (REDD+) identified within the Cancun Agreements.

Speaking at the recent Conservative party Conference in Manchester, held on 5-8^th October, shadow energy and climate change secretary Greg Clark claimed that the UK needed an ‘emergency plan to rescue our energy policy’ within days of a general election.

The current UK energy policy from a glance appears to contain many strong ‘green’ policies, but in some cases, and a certain level of financial commitment to funding these policies.  But unfortunately the impact of these policies is simply too early to tell.   It may be argued that the Labour Party have made several large strides in leading the way forward to the global talks in Copenhagen, by being the first country to call a UN Security Council meeting on climate change, and by being the first country to introduce a Climate Change Bill with the aim to reduce CO2 emissions by at least 20% by 2020.

Despite the above strides, the Conservative’s argue that UK is in a ‘dire position’ and is in absolute need for a new ‘Green Deal’ which aims to; 

• Provide £6,500 to every household to upgrade the energy efficiency of their home
• Improve the carbon footprint of the least efficient homes and save 9.4 million tonnes of CO2
• Create around 70,000 jobs, including 3,500 apprenticeships
• Open up a market worth £2.5 billion a year
• Authorise five GW of clean coal capacity fitted with carbon capture and storage
• Immediate publication of the planning needed for new nuclear power stations
• Give the right for every community to host wind farms and keep the revenue from business rates generated for 6 years
• Make the national grid extend its network offshore
• Build Marine energy parks
• Lastly, scrap Labour centralised, target led approach to house building

Over the past 12 years the UK government has seen 15 Energy Ministers tackle the climate change agenda.  The most recent drive from government, led by Ed Milliband in concentrated in the delivery if the Low Carbon Transition Plan and more widely known, the UK’s Climate Change Action Plan.

Supported by the establishment of the Department of Climate Change, another Labour initiative, a number of policy commitments are designed to create a low carbon economy, these include;

• Introduction of the Renewables Obligation
• Climate Change Levy (see rates through the HMRC link)
• Carbon Reduction Commitment
• Implementation of long-term legal Frameworks e.g. Committee for Climate Change to measure these changes
• Zero carbon homes target setting by 2016
• Development of a £100m blueprint for renewable energy – to target supply
• Adoption of a Waste Strategy aimed to deliver 9.3 million tonnes of savings of CO2 per year by 2020
• Water and air is recordable cleaner than 1997 levels and waste recycling has quadrupled

So how much of these green pledges are just talk?  The government has pledged big targets to reduce CO2 in the UK, but many of the Party members are aware of the small details on how they will be delivered.  For example, according to a study carried out by ComRes research of 150 MPs, it revealed that 72% were unaware of the government’s target for all new housing to be zero carbon from 2016.  The study further identified that members of the All-Party Parliamentary Group were unaware that a quarter of MPs didn’t know that more than a quarter of UK emissions came from Housing. 

Perhaps the green campaigns from both parties need to target their members, as well as communicating plans to its voters.  There are many successes attributed to the policies employed by the Labour Party to date, however, it is also clear of the recent challenges in delivery, for example, the Part-L planning consultation, the nuclear debate, and the changes to the Carbon Reduction Commitment timescales for its implementation. 

Once a policy is made, does it stand up strongly to meet the realistic outcomes, to time and budget, or simply sound good to the voters in Britain – you can decide, its your vote!