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 »

   Filed under: Earnings, Economics, Energy, Environment | 28 Comments »

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 »

   Filed under: Energy, Environment | No Comments »

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.

   Filed under: Energy | No Comments »

When Ofgem talks about power companies “sweating assets” you know something is up. So may I welcome Ofgem to the TUC’s energy podium, for a long-overdue meeting of minds?

Ofgem, February 2010: “The unprecedented combination of the global financial crisis, tough environmental targets, increasing gas import dependency and the closure of ageing power stations has combined to cast reasonable doubt over whether the current energy arrangements will deliver secure and sustainable energy supplies” (Project Discovery, 2010).

TUC, October 2006: “Faced with the new energy challenges of climate change and energy security, the UK’s liberalised energy market lacks the foundations on which to deliver the massive new investment required in low carbon and carbon-free energies” (TUC Executive Committee paper). Read more »

   Filed under: Energy, Environment | 2 Comments »

Please forgive this delayed reaction to a PM news item last Friday 8 January. It could have come straight from the climate change deniers’ brigade. I’ve had to check my facts. Presenter Eddie Mair reported that 70,000 new jobs would be created following the Government’s announcement of nine new offshore windfarms, requiring 6,000 massive wind turbines.

“70,000 jobs? A tricky one”, Eddie told us. He then asked Tim Harford, aka the Undercover economist, and presenter on BBC TV of “Trust Me, I’m an Economist” to comment. Read more »

   Filed under: Energy, Environment | 3 Comments »

Radical reforms to the tax system are needed to meet our climate change targets, shifting the tax burden from labour (income tax, NI) to carbon emissions, according to the Green Fiscal Commission. Launching the report, Commission chair Prof Paul Edkins called it a “tax shift, not a tax increase.”

Welcome though these ideas are,  they involved unresolved impacts on jobs and fuel poverty.

The numbers are huge, £150bn shifting away from labour to carbon taxes by 2020, including 10% off NI, the basic rate cut to 18% or lower, 10% on petrol duty and the widely reported £3,300 tax on new cars. Read more »

   Filed under: Energy, Environment, Tax | 1 Comment »

Skimming the papers today, I was confused there for a moment by a couple of news items. “Scientists claim fossil as missing link was really a dead end”. And then, “Tories  blown off course by Clarke’s windfarm verdict”.

Shadow Business Secretary, Ken Clarke, told the Policy Exchange yesterday that mainland Britain was “not suitable” for onshore windfarms. Sigh. Meanwhile, I read that Ida, the 47m-year-old primate, was not, after all, our earliest ancestor, but an evolutionary dead-end.

Read more »

   Filed under: Energy, Environment | Comments Off

John Prescott’s call for local councils to be put under an “obligation” to find a place where a wind farm could be built in their area irritated the National Alliance of Wind Farm Action Groups (NAWAG), but not half as much as those of us protesting at the jobs lost from the closure of the Vestas wind turbine maker on the Isle of Wight.

NAWAG was launched this summer with the goal of orchestrating a “grass-roots revolt” against “ruthless” wind farm developers. Their leading lights include corporate communications and public affairs lobbyists. They might want to take a look at the UK Climate Impacts Programme website. All areas of the UK get warmer by mid-century, and the warming is greater in summer than in winter. Precipitation (rain, hail, snow etc) is likely more often in the winter, with drier summers, for much of the UK. If countryside residents are anxious to protect their “chocolate box” views, as Prescott argued, the chocolate will melt in the summers of the future.

Read more »

   Filed under: Energy, Environment | Comments Off

David Cameron was criticised for saying very little about the environment in his speech to the Conservative Party conference. “Vote blue, get green” seemed to have been forgotten.

He certainly remedied his sin of omission yesterday with a major speech on the environment which is worth reading and has some interesting ideas. Read more »

   Filed under: Energy, Environment | Comments Off

There were two distinct responses to the Government’s consultation on carbon capture for coal-fired power stations. From the ‘green lobby’ that the framework is not tough enough, whilst generators are stating it is too tough and there is a real danger that nothing will be built.

Well, we now have our answer, from E.ON at least: Kingsnorth postponed, seen as “good news” by some. The economic downturn had “pushed back the need for a new plant in the UK to around 2016 because of the reduction in demand for electricity” But E.ON remains “committed to the development of cleaner coal and carbon capture and storage (CCS), which we believe have a key role to play in tackling the global threat of climate change, while ensuring affordability and security of energy supplies.”

This announcement will accelerate gas dependency, despite the recession. It will also delay the UK’s carbon capture technology platform. Read more »

   Filed under: Energy | Comments Off