The Committee on Climate Change released its latest report today highlighting the devastating impact the economic recession has had on carbon trading schemes and investment for low carbon technologies. The report emphasises the vast investment needed in efficiency through green housing, power and transport in Britain, to service the goal of meeting the commitments in the Climate Change Act.

The Committee has called for ‘dramatic improvements’ in efficiencies across the economy, suggesting that more ‘forceful’ policies may be required to increase annual cuts in emissions by four-fold.

The Committee also recommends

- The introduction of 1.7m electric cars, with 3.9m drivers trained in fuel-efficient techniques, by 2020

- Building 8,000 new wind turbines, alongside four new coal power stations fitted with carbon capture technology and three new nuclear power plants, to slash emissions from the power sector by 50% by 2020.

The Government’s largest proposed clean coal plant to be fitted with CCS was shelved by E.ON last week, also reportedly as a result of the recession. However, the announced delay in the Kingsnorth project, which had become the focus of protests against climate change, heavily targeted by climate camp activists and the media; leaves politicians wondering how they might fill the expected energy supply gap in 2016.

The recession has also had a significant impact on the world’s emissions trading schemes – expected to be pivotal in driving market signals for low carbon investment. The drop in energy consumption, which led to the shelving of the Kingsnorth project in the UK, has also led to a drop in emissions in Europe, resulting in a surplus of carbon credits in the EU ETS. It is feared that this might result in a carbon price of just €20 a tonne in 2020, rather than the €50 a tonne used for its previous analysis.

The Committee has suggested that options to strengthen the carbon price, including the government underwriting a minimum price or intervening in the electricity market, should be “seriously considered”. On Friday, a report from Ofgem suggesting domestic energy bills could rise 14-60% by 2020 was seen by energy industry experts as an acceptance that the market-driven system has failed and the government needs to be more interventionist.

So the recession has played its role in dampening the prospects of the low carbon investment opportunities, and strong leadership will be essential to deliver the ‘radical’ and ‘dramatic’ improvements that the Committee has demanded. With Ed Milliband’s small budget, and uncertainties over changes in government next year, the UK needs to dig deep to create green opportunities that rescue the nation from the dire straits, courtesy of the economic recession.

While there are many stories that could be told about the Global Day of Climate Action, I would like to talk about the rising star of climate campaigning: non-violent direct action, or NVDA.

Today campaigners in over 40 countries marched in a global effort to increase government action on climate change. Climatico had half-a-dozen analysts on the ground to report on the action.

After much walking, chanting, drumming, and shivering, our estimated 10,000-strong battalion of climate marchers rounded the corner into Parliament Square. After a few speeches and some music, we were greeted with two quotes:

“Direct action is the last resort of democracy”

“If you’re a young person looking at the future of this planet and looking at what is being done right now, and not done, I believe we have reached the stage where it is time for civil disobedience to prevent the construction of new coal plants that do not have carbon capture and sequestration.”

Any guesses as to who these were credited to?

Parliament Square by Dominic Rowland

Nope, not a bunch of eco-hippies, but Oscar Wilde and Al Gore (though I can’t find a source for the first).

Later, we heard from John McDonnell, the MP whose constituency includes Heathrow Airport, who gave a rousing speech in which he pledged to participate in NVDA if the government approved the plans to build a third runway at Heathrow.

Finally, Caroline Lucas MEP, came up on stage, inviting us all to a “tea party” (read sit-in) at Heathrow Terminal One.

So we have high-profile politicians calling for NVDA, a situation which is unlkely to have happened without the game-changing court verdict regarding the Greenpeace protesters at Kingsnorth. But will it work? Well there certainly seem to be a lot of people that hope so!

–

Now I would like your input: Is the growth of climate-related NVDA a UK-only phenomenon, or is this a global trend? And do you think that it is an effective mechanism for increasing government action? Leave your comments below…