Emissions boosted 2014 winter storm risk, big business handed taxpayer cash to cut electricity demand, & more

02.02.16

News

Carbon emissions boosted 2014 January storm risk ‘by 43%’

Sustained heavy rain and severe storms that led to flooding in the south of England in 2013/14 were made more likely by human-caused climate change. The new study says that climate change increased the chances of a once-in-a-century wet January in 2014 by 43%. “What was once a 1 in 100-year event in a world without climate change is now a 1 in 70-year event,” said co-author Dr Friederike Otto, of Oxford University, reports the Mail Online. Climate Central and New Scientist also cover the new research – as does Carbon Brief.

Big businesses handed taxpayer cash to install energy-saving lightbulbs

The Telegraph

The Government is funding British business giants pay to switch to energy-efficient lightbulbs as part of a £5m scheme to cut winter electricity demand, says this front page story in the Telegraph. The Football Association, Sainsbury’s and Dixons Carphone are among those awarded funding for upgrades such as replacing old fluorescent strip lighting with new LED lamps, says the Times. The Department of Energy and Climate Change said the move could save taxpayers money in the long run as businesses using less electricity would mean back-up power would cost less, reports the Sun.

Oxbridge academics demand end to fossil fuel investment

The Independent

More than 300 academics at Oxford and Cambridge have signed a joint statement calling on the institutions to divest from fossil fuels, says the front page of the Independent. The signatories, who include the former Archbishop of Canterbury, Lord Williams, and the incoming president of the Royal Society, Sir Venki Ramakrishnan, say that Oxford and Cambridge should put their multibillion-pound endowment funds to better use in the light of “looming social, environmental, and financial pressures”. In response, the University of Cambridge says it is currently reviewing its investment decisions, while Oxford has yet to comment.

Tackle cold homes, ministers told

BBC News

Bringing the UK’s ageing homes into the 21st century should be a key infrastructure priority, government ministers have been told. Opposition parties and institutions have told BBC News that the UK will miss targets to end fuel poverty and cut carbon emissions unless homes are insulated. The plan to focus on home energy efficiency was proposed by the right-leaning think-tank Policy Exchange, and the BBC found support from Labour, Lib Dems, SNP, and Plaid Cymru – as well as the Confederation of British Industry, the World Energy Council, the Institution of Civil Engineering and leading energy academics.

Queensland gives Adani environmental permit for Carmichael coalmine

The Guardian

Indian conglomerate Adani has secured an environmental permit from the Department of Environment and Heritage of the Queensland government to build Australia’s largest coal mine. It is one less hurdle for Adani’s highly contested plans, says the Guardian, though Adani still needs to obtain significant bank funding to realise its $16.5bn mine, rail and port project. The financing is needed to convince the Queensland government it has obtained “financial closure” before it will be allowed to begin dredging near Great Barrier Reef waters to expand the Abbot Point export facility.

Growing cost of grid, green fees blocks UK power price cut

Reuters

UK households will not benefit from a fall in market electricity prices because of rising costs elsewhere cancel out any wholesale price falls, say suppliers. Despite a 20-35% drop in wholesale electricity and gas prices in recent months, just two of the “Big Six” energy companies – E.ON and SSE – have announced 5% cuts to gas prices, and none has cut electricity prices, Reuters says. “Many of the other costs that make up an electricity bill and that we don’t control have increased or may increase,” said a spokeswoman for E.ON UK. “These include electricity network costs – transmission and distribution – as well as environmental levies, such as the renewable obligation and FiTs (feed-in-tariffs).”

Collapse in crude brings North Sea fields near end of production

The Financial Times

As many as 50 North Sea oil and gasfields could cease production this year after a collapse in crude prices to 12-year lows, industry experts have warned. This would accelerate the North Sea’s decline, potentially bringing forward billions of pounds in spending on decommissioning, say energy consultants Wood Mackenzie. The consultants identified dozens of smaller fields with high production costs that are approaching the end of their lives and are prime candidates to be shut. Elsewhere, the FT also reports that one of Britain’s biggest production companies – Premier Oil – has urged government ministers to give regulators the power to force oil and gas companies to invest in ageing North Sea infrastructure.

Tidal lagoon technology gets multimillion-pound boost

Press Association via Guardian

The development of UK tidal lagoon schemes has received a boost with a commitment of millions of pounds. The £10m investment by Indian commodity tycoons the Gupta family gives them a substantial stake in Tidal Lagoon Plc, a holding company set up to finance the development of full-scale tidal lagoons for clean power in the UK and abroad. Tidal Lagoon aims to start construction of the UK’s first tidal lagoon in Swansea Bay in spring 2017, notes BusinessGreen. Wales Online also has the story.

Comment

Momentum is increasing Towards a Flexible Electricity System based on Renewables

Nature Energy, Catherine Mitchell

The tide is turning towards a renewable, energy-efficient and flexible electricity system, argues Catherine Mitchell, professor of energy policy at the University of Exeter. Mitchell explores what a “no regrets” energy policy to increase flexibility would look like, and calls for public policy statements to be backed up by more effective governance support and pressure to speed up change.

Commentary: 1.5C and the climate research agenda after the Paris Agreement

Mike Hulme, Nature Climate Change

With countries’ pledges to reduce emissions falling a long way short of limiting warming to 2C above pre-industrial levels, one might wonder whether negotiators were “whistling in the dark” with the explicit mention in the Paris agreement of pursuing a more stringent limit of 1.5 °C, says Mike Hulme, professor of climate and culture at King’s College London. With the IPCC now requested to produce a special report on 1.5C in 2018, scientists should be cautious not to naively be drawn into undertaking new cycles of studies in the expectation that they will make a difference to the world of politics, says Hulme.

Science

New approaches to quantifying aerosol influence on the cloud radiative effect

PNAS

Climate models are being developed with an ever-increasing detail on aerosol composition, optical properties, formation of cloud nuclei, and complex cloud behaviour, but they are still not adequate to capture the fine-scale complexities of cloud-aerosol interactions, according to new research. The study proposes a new conceptual approach to pinning down the aerosol−cloud radiative effect in shallow clouds through a combination of modelling and satellite data.

Enhanced Atlantic sea level rise relative to the Pacific under high carbon emission rates

Nature Geoscience

On timescales of hundreds of years and with emission rates greater than five billion tonnes of carbon per year, models expect sea-level rise to larger in the Atlantic than Pacific Ocean. This is because of shorter flushing times and a weakening of the overturning circulation in the Atlantic, say the researchers, leading to an Atlantic Ocean that is warming faster than the Pacific.