Unintended consequences or not, Budget cuts for the very poorest will boost fuel poverty and undermine efforts to tackle climate change. Households in fuel poverty are already concentrated among exactly those families where the cuts will hit hardest. Worse, DWP Minister Steve Webb has not ruled out cuts in weekly Cold Weather payments this autumn. Media reports put Winter Fuel Allowance in the frame. Yet regressive Budgets sustain the high energy use of the most well off, widening the fuel divide between the poor and well-off.

The more unequal our society, the more remote are our CO2 reduction targets. Yet yesterday’s IFS report shows that the very poorest families with children lose more from the June Budget than any other group – facing a 5% cut in their total income. Yet the lowest third of households by income account for over 90% of those in fuel poverty in England.  Read more »

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Inequality profoundly matters in our efforts to tackle climate change and prevent runaway global warming. Risks to climate change policies are inherent in the coalition’s unfair and regressive cuts programme - like Winter Fuel Payments - squeezing the poor while effectively allowing the rich to continue to produce much higher levels of emissions. The Spirit Level warns that “Governments may be unable to make big enough cuts in carbon emissions without also reducing inequality.”

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Graham Honeyman, the Chief Executive of Sheffield Forgemasters, put a brave face on today’s decision to axe an £80m government loan, which would have created 180 jobs at the company. Describing this as a “huge disappointment”, he said it is important now to focus on other elements of the company’s development.

Good for him. But the TUC can’t be this sanguine. We are trade unionists, so of course we care about the loss of 180 potential new jobs. But we also care about investment in the future strength of British industry.

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The Energy Security and Green Economy Bill’s welcome news includes an energy efficiency drive, measures to set up and fund the Green Investment Bank, and reforms to the energy market. But a clamp down on coal-fired power station emissions could well scupper a vital bit of low carbon technology – CCS investment. More on that below.

The Green Bank has a big job ahead to help fund a £750 billion investment programme for new low carbon infrastructure and supply chain support by 2025. That’s £37.5 billion a year, according to E3G. Fortunately, All-Party support for the Green Investment Bank shifts the debate to the form and function of the Bank itself. Read more »

   Filed under: Energy, Environment | 1 Comment »

News at 6am this morning that DECC is cutting £34m from business support, including closure of the Low Carbon Buildings Programme, is hitting home across the renewables industry sector. Just a week ago, the Coalition agreement stated confidently that, “We will seek to increase the target for energy from renewable sources.”

If many of us hoped that the Coalition would at least protect and perhaps at best increase the drive to a low carbon economy, this move fails the test. What’s at stake is a £3m cut in the last stage of the renewable heat element of the Low Carbon Buildings Programme (LCBP). Devices like solar water heaters, ground source heat pumps, biomass installations are being installed in their low thousands now across the UK. Read more »

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“We will have to keep on working at national level to ensure Governments commit to an ambitious climate change treaty that includes the principles of just transition & decent work”.  This is the message from the ITUC’s representatives in Bonn as the UN ends the first of the 2010 round of negotiations on a global climate treaty.

The Copenhagen Accord, remember, was silent on labour and human rights. So we need to meet UK officials again, to ensure that our case for just transition is made afresh. And as climate change impacts increasingly affect life and livelihood in developing countries (see Oxfam’s report), so the ITUC will want to join forces with human rights campaigners to unify our demands.  Read more »

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Today’s ambitious Government plans to cut emissions from its own departments by a third by 2020 are a major opportunity for unions to push for Green Whitehall demonstrator projects. Under the new targets, government will reduce its greenhouse gas emissions by 34 % by 2020 (from 1999 levels). 18 government departments produced a Carbon Reduction Delivery Plan (CRDP). Each plan sets out, in detail, the actions each department will take.

Complementing this announcement, on 1 April 2010 the Carbon Reduction Commitment (CRC) kicks in.  Unions like PCS, and the TUC, are publishing Guidance on the scheme. The CRC creates a CO2 cap-and-trade scheme in 20,000 of the largest public and private sector organisations in the UK – central government departments, local authorities, hospitals, prisons, schools, universities, shops, hotels and banks. Read more »

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The Chancellor’s Budget speech was hugely welcome for its positive narrative about energy security, jobs and prosperity. With its firm focus on low carbon energy, the GIB is likely to emerge over the next few years as the funding arm for the Just Transition to a low carbon economy.

Hopefully, the GIB will therefore enjoy the same broad spectrum stakeholder representation of the new Forum for a Just Transition. The BIS/DECC-led stakeholder body involves the CBI, TUC, Energy Intensive Users, the regions and other partners in advising and strategizing on what a fair, low carbon future would look like.  Read more »

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We can reliably expect tens of thousands of new jobs in the Yorkshire and the Humber region, now designated a Low Carbon Economic Area (LCEA) for Carbon Capture and Storage (CCS) as part of Government plans to transform the UK into a low-carbon economy.

Part of today’s announcement by Energy and Climate Change Secretary, Ed Miliband is £6.3 million  awarded to Scottish and Southern Energy’s 100 tonne per day capture pilot project at Ferrybridge. This  will stimulate CCS development within the region. Read more »

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Unions are increasingly working with the environmental movement. We represent – or stand in solidarity with – many of those most likely to be badly hit by climate change. Union campaigns for health and safety in the workplace have always had much in common with wider campaigns against pollution. Many environmentalists have a similar commitment to social justice and internationalism that inform the best kinds of trade unionism – the victims of environmental degradation are usually the people for whom unions speak. Unions know that we need big changes in the way the economy work – and have helped put the concept of just transition on the international agenda.

But there are problems too. Read more »

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Our seas are a massive, renewable energy resource. The newly-formed RenewableUK (formerly BWEA) found a new focus yesterday in calling on Government to invest a further £150-£200 million in two renewable technologies – wave and tidal energy. Companies like Siemens and Vattenfall are keen to invest in wave and tidal power, in places like the Pentland Firth. The driver here, surely, is the Government’s high level commitment to get 15% of our total energy from renewables by 2020. This means generating a third of our electricity supply from technology that only now being developed and built. Read more »

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The launch of the new Neptune Blade facility in Newcastle today is a fantastic development for the whole of the region. 

The TUC rightly welcomed today’s announcement from US company Clipper Windpower to build a factory making the world’s largest turbine blade in Newcastle. What’s involved is a 10 megawatt (MW) Britannia wind turbine. Each turbine will be able to satisfy the annual electricity consumption of over 6500 households. The factory building the blades will be based on Tyneside, creating 500 jobs by 2020. 

It’s the supply chain that also counts here: as the BWEA points out, Clipper’s factory joins a growing number of UK businesses capitalising on the onshore and offshore wind supply chain.  A year ago, Clipper Windpower established an R&D facility at the New and Renewable Energy Centre (NaREC) in Blyth, 15 miles from Newcastle. 60,000 to 70,000 new jobs could be generated in wind alone by 2020. The potential 40+ gigawatts (GW) of offshore wind alone could supply over a third of our country’s electricity. 

Commenting today, TUC General Secretary Brendan Barber said: “Clipper’s decision, backed by £8million Government investment from its low carbon technology fund, is a huge stride forward for the UK’s renewable industry.”

 But there’s a steel sting in the tail. Each turbine needs maybe a thousand tonnes of steel. This week, Corus announced the mothballing of Teesside Cast Products. Naturally, it drew an angry reaction from Community union, alleging the company had washed their hands of a loyal and skilled workforce, with the loss of 1,600 jobs. These core, energy intensive industries matter every bit as much as the new green technologies in our low carbon future.

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