ENVIRONMENT-BRITAIN: Blair Takes on Global Warming

By Sanjay Suri Reprint | | Print |

Sanjay Suri

LONDON, Feb 24 2003 (IPS) - British Prime Minister Tony Blair announced ambitious targets Monday to check global warming – and took a step away from the close Anglo-American relations over Iraq to criticise the U.S. for not doing enough to tackle it.

“The recent divisions in international relations are plain,” Blair told a meeting on sustainable development in London. “I remain hopeful we can pull people round to a common position. But in reality they mask a deeper and more worrying divide. The world is in danger of polarising around two different agendas.”

Blair described global warming and the climate change this is causing as the most serious agenda over which there is a divide. Such issues, he said, are “just as devastating in their potential impact, some more so.”

Blair said “There will be no lasting peace while there is appalling injustice and poverty. There will be no genuine security if the planet is ravaged by climate change.”

Blair said that extreme weather events caused damage worth 55 billion dollars last year. The United Nations Environment Programme had said that loss from severe weather is doubling every decade, Blair pointed out.

“We will continue to make the case to the U.S. and to others that climate change is a serious threat that we must address together as an international community,” he said. Blair warned of a divide over the issue of climate change. “The polarity is there,” he said. “And it is dangerous. It divides sometimes along left-right lines. It divides along North-South lines. It divides the U.S. and its allies from the rest.”

Blair said the Kyoto protocol on climate change was an “enormous achievement” but was not “radical enough.” Global emission of greenhouse gases have risen 10 per cent since 1990, with a 35 per cent increase in developing countries, he said. “At best Kyoto will mean a reduction of 2 per cent in emissions.” And even this target, he said, had “proved controversial with some countries, notably America.”

Blair said Britain hoped to go for a 60 per cent cut in emissions by 2050 by harnessing new technologies. Blair based his target on a report from Imperial College in London, which says that emissions can be reduced 60 per cent using known technologies, and at reasonable cost.

Solar energy can supply world energy demand using just one per cent of the land currently under crops and pasture, Blair said. “There is also huge potential from wind, wave and other renewable technologies,” he said. Britain is looking to tidal sites to provide a sixth of its energy needs. He also signalled a departure away from nuclear energy for the future.

Blair said it is a “myth that reducing emissions makes us poorer.” He said British economy has grown 17 per cent since 1997 while emissions fell 5 per cent.

A white paper on energy launched Monday by Trade and Industry Secretary Patricia Hewitt sets out the aim of producing 20 per cent of energy from renewable sources by 2020. But the environment group WWF warned that the white paper “lacks the substance to deliver the government’s rhetoric.” The paper announces an aim but has “no clear medium term strategy for delivering the development of sustainable energy technologies.”

The government has also not said “how it intends to deliver real emissions reductions and long-term investment in low carbon technologies,” says Andrew Lee, director of campaigns with WWF.

Friends of the Earth welcomed the plans to work towards cutting climate changing emissions of carbon dioxide but warned: “These plans must be accompanied by clear timetables, targets and investment if they are to be achieved.” It said the government had “intervened to water down specific pledges in the white paper.”

Energy campaigner for Friends of the Earth said: “It appears that at long last the Government accepts that the nuclear dream is over, and that a huge investment in renewable energy and efficiency is needed to secure our energy needs and combat climate change.”

Greenpeace also welcomed the announcements but said: “The dropping of firm targets for renewable energy from the paper could put investment into renewable energy projects at risk. Investors and developers needed the government to make a clear long-term commitment to the renewable industry, by setting a clear target.”