Heat and Energy stratergy “lacks urgency”

Major energy efficiency investment needed in 2009 Budget

Commenting on the Government’s Heat and Energy Strategy Danny Stevens, Environmental Industries Commission (EIC) Policy Director, said:

“EIC welcome the Heat and Energy Strategy’s focus on energy efficiency. Securing energy savings in home is the most cost effective way of meeting the Government’s stated aim to reduce household carbon emissions by at least 80 per cent by 2050.

“Simply setting a target, however, is not enough - actually meeting it requires urgent action. Yet, all we have today is the launch of yet another consultation. This undermines the urgency of tackling climate change and ignores the huge economic benefits of ambitious environmental protection measures.

“EIC’s recent “Green Jobs Growth Strategy” [1] set out a coordinated approach to ensure that the UK is at the forefront of this huge global business opportunity. The Strategy called for an urgent £1.5 billion of additional investment in energy efficiency retrofitting of low-income family homes, which would create in the region of 145,000 jobs. This is the sort of ambition we need from Government.

“And the potential is huge. For example, the EU Energy Efficiency Action Plan estimates that the full potential is a reduction of around 27 per cent of energy use. Adopting policies that secure this level of energy reduction would also create many thousands of green collar jobs.

“If the Government is serious about tackling climate it must be far more ambitious and act far more urgently.”

UK’s low-carbon sector could create 1m jobs

Lord Peter Mandelson, the Business Secretary, has revealed that the UK’s low-carbon industries could create more than a million jobs in a decade, with the global market reaching £3 trillion.

During a speech at the London Jobs Summit, the Government representative claimed the sector offers prime opportunities to replace positions lost through the recession.

He added that the industry will grow in the coming years as both developed and emerging markets transfer to applications with a lower carbon cost.

“If the UK takes advantage of the opportunities available and realises this growth, we could see more than a million jobs in this sector by the middle of the next decade,” said Lord Mandelson.

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The industry, which currently employs over 800,000 British people, is the sixth largest in the UK.

For the UK to be successful in this “fearsomely competitive” area, Lord Mandelson believes the country must develop the right skills base and invest strategically in the correct research and process innovation.

He has recently approved a £35 million business start-up programme in the UK, which is set to create 23,000 jobs in the next five years.

Government to treble number of Career Development Loans

Measures to boost skills, fair access to education and pathways into work at the heart of Government’s New Opportunities White Paper

The number of career development loans available for people who want to undertake training, develop their skills and realise their full potential will treble under plans announced today as part of the Government’s New Opportunities White Paper.

The big increase over the next two years will mean 45,000 new and rebranded Professional and Career Development Loans will be made available in 2010/11, up from the 15,000 currently available this financial year.

The new loans are also being made more attractive by reducing the headline interest rates and allowing people to apply for loans of up to £10,000 to study at colleges, universities and private training providers - an increase from the current limit of £8,000.

Announcing details of the expansion, Skills Secretary John Denham
said:

“Often in tougher times, people start to look at the options open to them in developing new skills or training up in something new. We know that as well as being more attractive to employers, people with better skills and higher levels of training will be better prepared to take advantage of new opportunities when the upturn comes.

“Our expansion of the new Professional and Career Development Loans will help thousands of people to access the support they need to make a success of their careers and realise their full potential, especially those who fall outside groups who automatically receive financial support.”

The New Opportunities White Paper, published today by the Prime Minister, announces a wide-ranging package of investment and support from across Government for people to make the most of their potential throughout their lives giving them lifelong chances to succeed.

Key announcements from the Department for Innovation, Universities and Skills (DIUS) include:

Widening participation and fair access in education

* working with DCSF to guarantee that all young people from low income backgrounds with the potential to succeed at higher education are given a structured package of mentoring, advice and support to get to university. By 2012, pupils from low income backgrounds who are roughly in the top 50 per cent of performers will be guaranteed this package, which will be equivalent to what pupils get in the best schools;
* working with 11 selective universities to increase outreach work to identify talented students from disadvantaged backgrounds to offer them the chance to show what they can achieve, given the chance.
Pilots will run from this year with a new scheme beginning in 2012 which we expect to help 10,000 students a year together with an expected 15-20 universities;
* requiring universities to publish details of what they are doing to raise aspirations and identify talent among young people from all backgrounds; and
* making it simpler to go to university after an apprenticeship, working with UCAS to incorporate apprenticeship frameworks into the UCAS points system by 2010.

Supporting people in getting on at work

* piloting new earned rights of £500 for people who have taken over five years out of work to care for children or adults for skills training to get them back into work;
* supporting the most vulnerable in the labour market, by piloting offering up to £500 for low income families on working tax credit to get training;
* encouraging companies to use Train to Gain funding to train agency workers they hire, even though they are not their permanent employer.
We will learn from existing schemes in which employment agencies offer training for temporary workers; and
* promoting supported work and employment for people with learning difficulties.

Building strong pathways from education into work

We have rescued apprenticeships and rebuilt them so they are well on their way to being a mainstream option for young people. To expand apprenticeships further, we are:

* creating up to ten new apprenticeship training associations across the country by the end of this year, delivering up to 15,000 apprenticeship places by 2014/15 to be hired out to businesses at no risk to themselves;
* expanding employer-led Group Training Associations to offer apprenticeships in sectors with low proportions of apprentices such as small businesses (SMEs) or with a high recruitment of graduates;
* increasing the number of apprenticeships available in the public sector so they offer equivalent opportunities to those already on offer in the private sector.

Commenting on the DIUS package, John Denham said:

“Today’s package of support and investment represents the real help we are offering people at all stages of their lives.

“It is vital that we make the most of everyone’s talent regardless of whether they are a gifted child from a deprived background, a parent returning to work or an apprentice aiming for a university education.

“By supporting people in achieving a place in society based on their talent, not only do we secure our future economic success as a country but enable individuals to build better lives and more secure futures for themselves, their children and communities.”

Today’s measures build on work already under way and previously announced as part of the Government’s response to the economic downturn.

Notes to editors:

1. This press notice applies to England.

2. The New Opportunities White Paper was published by the Cabinet Office today. For more information and to read the full document go
to: http://www.hmg.gov.uk/newopportunities

3. Professional and Career Development Loans: Anyone aged 18 or over and who is ordinarily resident in Great Britain and has an unlimited right to remain in the United Kingdom can apply for a Career Development Loan. Whereas previously individuals could apply for loans between £300 and £8,000, today we have announced the maximum will increase to £10,000. The Government pays the interest on the loan for the period of the course covered by the loan. The individual is then responsible for making repayments, including interest.

Career Development Loans have operated for twenty years, successfully providing opportunities to individuals prepared to invest in their own learning. Evidence from this scheme has shown the willingness of significant numbers of individuals to use loans with nearly 250,000 people borrowing £960m for vocational qualifications ranging from entry level 1 to postgraduate, and non-accredited vocational courses.
15 per cent of people were unemployed or not working when they took a CDL, excluding existing students. Feedback from customers has been positive with 85 per cent saying they would recommend CDLs to others.
For more information go to:
http://www.direct.gov.uk/en/EducationAndLearning/AdultLearning/FinancialHelpForAdultLearners/CareerDevelopmentLoans/index.htm

The Government has agreed with the three participating banks - Barclays, the Co-operative, and RBS - that interest rates offered to individuals for Professional and Career Development Loans will be lower than those currently offered under the existing CDL scheme.
These lower rates will be set in due course.

4. Widening participation and fair access in education: Building on work already in place through initiatives like Aimhigher and by individual institutions we will work with DCSF to guarantee that by 2012, pupils from low income backgrounds who are roughly in the top 50 per cent of performers get a comprehensive package of assistance.
This assistance will be as good as is given to young people in the best schools and colleges with high rates of progression to HE. In addition, we are currently working with a group of 11 research-intensive universities who will pilot ways to identify talented students from groups currently under represented in HE. The group is in discussion with other universities and we expect the eventual size of the group to be between 15 and 20 helping 10,000 young people a year by 2012.

From this year all higher education institutions (HEIs) will be asked to produce widening participation strategic assessments which they will submit to the Higher Education Funding Council for England (HEFCE). The assessments will included in HEI’s access agreements with the Office for Fair Access (OFFA) and will set out the broad level of resources that institutions will commit to widening participation, including their outreach work with schools. The assessments will be a condition of the continued receipt of the Higher Education Funding Council for England (HEFCE) widening participation allocation.
http://www.hefce.ac.uk/news/hefce/2009/wpassess.htm

The Government is determined that vocational routes to HE should be regarded equally against academic routes. The Government is also committed to incorporating all Apprenticeship frameworks into the UCAS tariff. World-Class Apprenticeships: Unlocking Talent, Building Skills for All - the Government’s Strategy for the Future of Apprenticeship in England in January 2008 included proposals to ensure clear progression routes, including to Higher Education, are embedded within Apprenticeship frameworks.

5. Supporting people in getting on at work: We want to make sure that there is continued support for those people who are in work and want to keep improving their skills to get on. We will pilot new earned rights of up to £500 worth of training for those caring for adults and children to support them in returning to the labour market. In addition we will expand Train to Gain to improve the skills of agency workers. This will build support for SME’s (who are the top priority for Train to Gain funds, including the £350 million growth over the next two years) to train their staff. There will also be additional support for people with learning difficulties through the Foundation Learning Tier helping them to progress into further education and employment.

6. Building strong pathways from education into work: We will expand the number of apprenticeship places available to give people real help through the downturn and, by investing in their skills, to prepare businesses and workers for the upturn. We will create new Apprenticeship Training Associations to act as recruitment agencies, employing apprentices and hiring them out to “host” employers. This innovative model, already in operation in Australia, gives greater flexibility to businesses and greater security to apprentices. We will encourage employers to form Group Training Associations to offer apprenticeships in sectors with low proportions of apprentices - such as those who have previously recruited graduates or those with a high proportion of small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs). This benefits businesses through economies of scale and increases the number of apprentices, and the skill levels, in under-represented sectors. We will increase the number of public sector apprenticeships available. The public sector accounts for 20% of the national workforce but offers less than 10% of employer places. The Learning and Skills Council (LSC) has begun work to drive this growth and each central Government Department has appointed a ministerial champion to lead in their area.

7. For more information on the DIUS elements of the White Paper, or to request a media interview with John Denham, call the DIUS Press Office on 020 3300 8882 or 020 3300 8883.

Call to promote green technologies

Every home should have ultra-fast broadband within a decade, David Cameron is due to say as he sets out plans to make the UK a world leader in green technologies.

Britain had fallen way behind European rivals in the push to exploit the multi-trillion pound market in planet-friendly business, he will warn, and must do “a lot better”.  Mr Cameron will deliver his message as the party publishes two independent policy reports on how the party could boost the chances of British firms in the sector. 

They call for a massive new state investment in green technology “incubators”, free access to testing facilities, a new Low Carbon Index of green firms and tax breaks on their shares. And the party leader will also announce a full-scale review of the creative industries led by an as-yet-unnamed “leading public figure”.

Building a new fibre-optic broadband network is one of the projects included by Prime Minister Gordon Brown in his bid to spend the UK out of economic crisis. Mr Cameron will say urgent action is required to improve internet services in the UK, which had “some of the slowest broadband speeds in the developed world”. He will say: “Fibre optic broadband is changing the way people work and do business, and it has the potential to completely transform our economy. It could open up new markets for our creative industries, promote innovation, create new, family-friendly jobs as people can work from home - and help reduce carbon emissions.

“But in Britain we have some of the slowest broadband speeds in the developed world and when it comes to investing in next generation broadband networks, like fibre optics to the home, we’re doing very badly compared to countries like Germany.

“We need to move much faster towards a Britain where fibre right into people’s homes is the norm for everyone and a Conservative Government will do everything it can to make it happen within a decade.”

Motorists will have to drive electric cars for UK to meet climate change targets

Motorists will have to switch to electric cars if Britain is to meet its legally-binding commitment to cut carbon dioxide emissions, a Government report warns.

The Committee on Climate Change will recommend that large numbers of motorists must switch to the greener vehicles by 2025.

The influential Committee, headed by Lord Turner, sets out the major technological advances needed for Britain to meet its commitment of cutting emissions by 80 per cent to halt global warming.

Gordon Brown is a major advocate of electric cars and is likely to welcome the recommendation. He has already called for a million “green collar” jobs to be created in new environmentally-friendly industries. At the G8 summit in Japan last summer, Mr Brown’s wife was photographed test-driving green vehicles.

Today’s report is expected to say that Britain currently generates the equivalent of 10-12 tons of carbon dioxide annually per person - about 700m tons in total. This must be cut to two tons per person annually by 2050 - about 12 pounds per person each day.

However, a typical family car uses the total daily allowance driving just 25 miles. Therefore, it is not seen as feasible to meet the new targets without largely abandoning the internal combustion engine.

Last month, Professor Julia King, a Government adviser and member of the Climate Change committee, said: “In the long term, C02-free road transport fuel is the only way to decarbonise road transport. That means electric vehicles, with novel batteries charged by zero-carbon electricity or hydrogen produced from zero-carbon electricity”.

The Government is believed to favour so-called “plug-in hybrids” which run on electricity but also have small internal combustion engines.

Lord Turner’s report, called Building a Low Carbon Economy, will set out a series of five year “carbon budgets” to cover the period until 2022. These will set out how much carbon the country must cut in each period and the technological methods that will be required to achieve the reductions. Whitehall is set to lead the way with each minister given a target to reduce carbon emissions in their department.

The report is also expected to recommend a big increase in carbon capture - technology which stores carbon dioxide emitted from the burning of coal and gas by power stations.

The Government has already cut road taxes on electric cars sharply. However, Mr Brown has met widespread protests when attempting to increase taxes on so-called gas guzzlers and petrol. The Treasury recently watered-down plans to double the tax on some polluting family cars.

Photo courtesy of www.greenfleet.net

 

 

 

UK’s Climate Change Body To Unveil Emissions Cut Plans

LONDON - Britain’s chief climate change adviser will recommend today how the government can meet tough targets to pare planet-warming carbon emissions, including what role coal should play in the country’s energy future.

In its first report, the Committee on Climate Change will weigh how Britain can meet ambitious goals to slash planet-warming greenhouse gas emissions while taking account of the economic downturn, energy security and volatile fuel prices.

British Prime Minister Gordon Brown set up the committee to advise ministers on what his government describes as the world’s greatest environmental challenge.

Britain and other countries say climate change will cause extreme weather, leading to food and water shortages, rising sea levels and flooding and outbreaks of disease.

Energy and Climate Minister Ed Miliband has already accepted the committee’s proposal to sharpen a b

inding national target to cut greenhouse gas emissions by 2050, to an 80 percent cut from 60 percent.

Now the committee chaired by Adair Turner — also head of Britain’s financial watchdog — has the job of advising how the government can achieve this, possibly recommending the end of unconstrained emissions from coal plants.

COAL

Coal is one of the world’s cheapest and most accessible forms of energy, but also one of the main contributors to climate change.

The committee will advise on constraints on new coal-fired power plants which may include attaching expensive carbon-cutting technologies which would dramatically dent coal’s competitiveness.

German utility E.ON AG plans to build a new coal plant in Kingsnorth in Kent, in south-east Britain. Climate protestors scaled the security fences in August in an attempt to disrupt output at an existing plant there, due to close by 2015.

The government wants any new coal plants to demonstrate plans for fitting, in the future, technology called carbon capture and storage (CCS) which traps carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions and buries them underground.

The committee may set a clear date for when CCS should become mandatory on such new build coal plants.

Utilities say fitting CCS will cost around $1 billion extra per plant and cut efficiency by about one quarter.

They are also concerned that there will be a power generation gap between 2015 and 2020 which will have to be filled by gas-fired plants, because there is too much uncertainty in the government’s stance on coal.

“Government policy towards coal needs to be clearer and firmer before people will go ahead,” said David Porter, chief executive of the Association of Electricity Producers.

Turner’s group is also expected to advise how achievable is Britain’s target to get 15 percent of its energy from renewable sources by 2020 versus 1.3 percent in 2005.

Investors in renewable energy like wind and solar power hope that if the report’s proposals are implemented by the government, there will be more clarity.

“Broadly speaking it ought to be welcome to investors because it should set a playing field against which investments can start to be made with a medium-term perspective,” said Ian Simm, chief executive of Impax Asset Management.

The report comes as 190 countries meet in Poznan, Poland, in Dec. 1-12 talks to review progress in a two-year drive to agree a new global climate treaty by the end of 2009.

 

 

Environment Agency Chairman calls for ‘Green New Deal’ to create jobs and investment

The Environment Agency’s Chairman, Lord Chris Smith, today urged the Government to follow Barack Obama’s example and launch a ‘Green New Deal’ for the UK economy to drive investment in clean energy and create jobs.

He called on the Government to produce a comprehensive long-term strategy for investing in renewable energy, environmental technology, energy efficiency and carbon capture and storage. He said it was essential if the Government is to meet its target of an 80 per cent reduction in carbon emissions by 2050.

And he claimed that the long term future of society now depends on the Government’s commitments to the environment as much as it does to education, health and the economy.

Lord Chris Smith urged the Chancellor to invest in green capital projects and schemes to mitigate the recession and climate change. And he encouraged more public sector organisations to take advantage of the Partnership for Renewables initiative to site renewable energy sources on their buildings or land. The Environment Agency today announced plans to site up to 80 wind turbines on its land - enough to generate electricity for 90,000 households.

Lord Chris Smith outlined the key elements of delivering a ‘Green New Deal’ programme. They include:

• Development of Carbon Capture and Storage for coal-fired power stations - initially in demonstration projects, but thereafter on a wider scale
• More incentives for energy efficiency in homes and businesses
• Greater use of combined heat and power
• Removal of disincentives from development of anaerobic digestion and other sustainable biomass projects
• Feed-in tariffs and grants to help householders to develop sustainable energy
• A major national programme for power generation through wind, solar and tidal sources
• Continuing development of work (especially on rivers and coasts) to protect from, and adapt to, the impact of climate change

The Environment Agency’s national conference also includes keynote speeches by Ed Miliband, Hilary Benn and Boris Johnson.

Lord Chris Smith said:

“We need a Green New Deal to meet our carbon emissions targets and create jobs in renewable energy and green technology. We need an ambitious and coherent strategy for the future, which is matched by investment by Government to kick-start key projects.

“We are facing a recession and there will be pressure to weaken environmental targets. I hope the Government will hold its nerve and deliver a far-reaching programme that looks further than the current crisis to deliver on our 2050 targets.”

Phot courtesy of freefoto.com