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Daily Briefing |

TODAY'S CLIMATE AND ENERGY HEADLINES

Briefing date 01.07.2016
UK backs world-leading climate target, but lacks policies to meet emissions cuts, & more

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News.

Climate change: UK backs world-leading climate target
BBC News Read Article

The UK government has accepted the fifth carbon budget and its commitment to cut carbon emissions by 57% by 2032, compared to 1990 levels. The world-leading, and legally-binding, target was part of the latest advice provided by the Committee on Climate Change. The commitment should ease anxieties in the green energy sector that last week’s leave vote would water down the UK’s leadership on climate change, says the Guardian. Secretary of State for Energy and Climate Change Amber Rudd said “Setting long-term targets to reduce emissions is a fundamental part of building a secure, affordable and clean energy infrastructure system,” reportsReuters. Responding to the announcement, Labour’s shadow energy secretary, Barry Gardiner, said: “At a time of great division and instability, I welcome the decision to set the Fifth Carbon Budget.” Labour also says the government left it so late to notify Parliament about the Carbon Budget that it is technically in breach of the Climate Change Act. The Times, Climate Home, The Hill, and Carbon Pulse also have the story, and Business Green rounds up the reaction to the budget being approved.

UK lacks policies to meet more than half its carbon emissions cuts – report
The Guardian Read Article

The UK has no policies in place to meet more than half of the carbon emission cuts required by law by 2030 under the fifth carbon budget, the government’s official advisers have warned. The annual progress report from the Committee on Climate Change (CCC) says emissions from electricity generation have been falling fast, but that pollution from transport is rising and that action on cutting carbon emissions from homes has gone backwards. The CCC also warns that the UK’s Brexit vote has thrown some EU-linked climate policies into doubt. The report urges the Government to continue to offer financial support for onshore wind and solar farms, as they were “the cheapest forms of low-carbon electricity generation,” reports the Telegraph. “Excluding these technologies increases costs for UK consumers,” it says. “It’s been a mixed scorecard,” CCC chief executive Matthew Bell tells Business Green: “Some areas have progressed and some areas have clearly gone backwards, [such as] cancellation of carbon capture and storage projects, funding around energy efficiency, and the cancellation of the zero carbon homes standard.”

Heathrow dealt huge blow as Government delays airport expansion decision
The Telegraph Read Article

The Government has been criticised by leading business figures after it delayed a decision on airport expansion following the UK’s vote to leave the EU. Adam Marshall, the acting director general of the British Chambers of Commerce, accused ministers of “a cop out” after Patrick McLoughlin, the transport secretary, said it would be “at least October” before an announcement is made about where to build more runway capacity in the south east. David Cameron had been due to unveil a decision on Heathrow’s £17.6bn third runway in early July. The BBC also has the story.

Trade unions press EDF to delay Hinkley Point C decision
The Financial Times Read Article

Britain’s vote to leave the EU makes it “more necessary than ever” for EDF to delay its final investment decision on the Hinkley Point nuclear project, say three trade unions representing thousands of workers at the company. The CGT, CFE-CGC and the FO unions issued a joint statement on Thursday saying the Brexit vote added “new elements of uncertainty” to the £18bn project. A majority of the EDF unions, which have six seats on the 18-member board between them, want to delay any binding commitment to Hinkley Point, says the FT.

India to get over $1 billion from World Bank for Modi's solar goals
Reuters Read Article

The World Bank is to lend India more than $1bn for its huge solar energy programme, which aims to raise India’s solar capacity nearly 30 times to 100 gigawatts by 2020. The agreement also establishes the World Bank as a financial partner in the India-led International Solar Alliance, says the Associated Press. The alliance, launched by India and France at the UN Climate Summit in Paris last year, plans to boost solar energy in developing countries by mobilising $1tn in investments by 2030. In a statement, World Bank President Jim Yong Kim says: “Prime Minister Modi’s personal commitment toward renewable energy, particularly solar, is the driving force behind these investments.”

Fuel poverty affects 2.5m households
The Times Read Article

Nearly 2.5 million households in England are living in fuel poverty, according to the latest figures from the Department of Energy and Climate Change. Fuel poverty, defined as households that spend more than 10% of their income on heating their homes, increased by 1.4% in 2014. In total, that represents around 11% of the 25.2 million households in England. The West Midlands, northeast and southwest of England suffer the highest levels, with more than one in eight households classified as fuel poor.

Renewables deliver a quarter of UK power - Your-need-to-know DECC data update
Madeleine Cuff, BusinessGreen Read Article

Business Green delves into the latest batch of energy data released by the Department of Energy and Climate Change. The figures show that the UK’s share of renewable electricity generation rose during the first quarter of the year, hitting 25.1% – a 2.3% increase on the same quarter last year. Total greenhouse gas emissions clocked in at 483m tonnes of CO2 equivalent for the 12 months to the end of the first quarter – this marks a 32m tonne decrease compared to the same period in 2015.

Comment.

Claim that jet stream crossing equator is ‘climate emergency’ is utter nonsense
Jason Samenow , The Washington Post Read Article

Claims that the jet stream crossing the equator is “unprecedented” and “a global climate emergency” are “unsupported and unscientific” says Samenow. The claims, first reported in one scientist’s blog, and subsequently picked up by Raw Story, the Independent and the Daily Express, suggest that the sub-tropical jet stream – a fast-flowing river of air high up in the atmosphere – in the northern hemisphere has joined up with its equivalent in the southern hemisphere for the first time. “Our climate system behaviour continues to behave in new and scary ways that we have never anticipated, or seen before,” the blog says. However, speaking to several scientists, Samenow finds that “without exception, they said air flow between the hemispheres is not at all uncommon.” “This is total nonsense,” Cliff Mass, a professor of meteorology at the University of Washington, tells the Post: “The analysis is making mistakes that even one of my junior undergrads would not make.” That the claim has proliferated on the internet highlights “the danger of wild assertions made by non-experts reaching and misleading the masses,” says Samenow.

Could Cameron's parting gift to the green economy secure his climate legacy?
James Murray, BusinessGreen Read Article

In David Cameron’s act of accepting the fifth carbon budget, he “appears to have come full circle and returned unequivocally to his green, husky-hugging roots,” writes Murray. It would have been easy for the government to defer the decision, he says, but “Instead, Cameron and [Amber] Rudd did the right thing. They honoured their manifesto commitment to respect the Climate Change Act and got on with the serious business of running the country in its best long term interests.” “David Cameron will not be remembered kindly by many environmentalists,” he says, but “in rubberstamping the fifth carbon budget, the Prime Minister has underlined the fact he was ultimately a genuine and often effective supporter of climate action.”

Science.

Emergence of healing in the Antarctic ozone layer
Science Read Article

The ozone hole is undergoing a recovery since the industrial chlorofluorocarbons that cause ozone depletion are were phased out under the Montreal Protocol. Observations and model calculations show a chemically-driven recovery emerging in September, though dynamical and temperature changes are also thought to have contributed to the healing. A new paper explores the factors that interfere with its recovery, such as the 2015 eruption of Calbuco, which resulted in a record October ozone hole.

Rapid climate-driven loss of breeding habitat for Arctic migratory birds
Science Read Article

A study of migratory birds suggests 66-83% of Arctic shore bird species will lose the majority of their currently suitable habitat by 2070. Rapid climate change in the High North strongly affects where species are able to breed and disrupts migratory connections globally, say the authors. They project that suitable climatic conditions will decline acutely in the most species rich regions of western Alaska and eastern Russia, becoming concentrated in the Eurasian and Canadian Arctic islands.

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