12:15pm Thursday 15th July 2010
A HAMPSHIRE MP has today joined forces with his European counterparts to call for a cut in greenhouse gases.
Climate Change Secretary Chris Huhne, along with his French and German counterparts to call on Europe to increase its planned greenhouse gas emissions cuts to 30% by the end of the decade.
Writing in the Financial Times, the ministers said there was a ''tremendous opportunity'' to ensure the economic recovery set Europe on a low carbon path which would stimulate financial growth, provide jobs, tackle climate change and improve energy security.
A failure to do so would mean the EU faced continued uncertainty and significant costs from volatile energy prices and global warming, they warned.
But the current target to cut emissions by 20% on 1990 levels by 2020 is a key barrier to setting the EU on the path to a low-carbon future.
They said the EU would end up in the ''global slow lane'' if it did not address the issue, falling behind countries such as China, Japan and the US in the race to capitalise on low carbon growth.
The EU agreed its plan to cut emissions by 20% 18 months ago, but said it would increase its target to 30% if other countries showed similar ambition as part of a global climate deal - which last year's UN talks in Copenhagen failed to deliver.
Today, Eastleigh MP Mr Huhne, along with German federal environment minister Dr Norbert Rottgen and French environment minister Jean-Louis Borloo said raising the 2020 target to 30% would be a genuine attempt to limit global temperature rises to 2C and avoid dangerous climate change.
Such a move would encourage other countries to take similar steps.
And it would make ''good business sense'' by sending a strong signal of the EU's commitment to a low-carbon future and provide greater certainty and predictability to investors.
In the article, which is also published in Le Monde and Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung, the trio said the 20% target was too low to drive investment in green technology and renewables.
The recession had seen emissions in the EU energy and heavy industry sectors fall by 11%, and partly as a result the price for carbon credits those sectors must buy to cover their pollution was too low to stimulate investment in green jobs and technology.
The ministers also said the recession had reduced the extra cost of aiming for the more ambitious target.
The annual cost of meeting the 20% cut goal by 2020 had fallen a third from 70 billion euros (£58 billion) to 48 billion euros (£40 billion).
The move to a 30% reduction would only be 11 billion euro a year (£9 billion) more than the original cost of achieving the 20% cut - a additional cost worth less than 0.1% of the EU economy, they said.
Delayed investment in low-carbon energy sources could cost 300 billion to 400 billion euro (£250bn to £330bn) at the global level - and potentially more if oil prices rise above conservative assumptions, while rising oil prices will lower the cost of a move to a low-carbon economy.
The ministers said some energy-intensive industries would be exposed to higher than average costs from the more ambitious target.
But they said the real threat those industries faced was not from higher carbon prices but ''collapsing demand in European construction and infrastructure markets''.
Boosting investment in large-scale low carbon infrastructure, such as offshore wind farms, which are ''voracious'' users of steel, cement, aluminium and chemicals was a sure way to increase demand for the materials energy-intensive industries produced.
The ministers said: We need to give our companies the chance to grow domestically while continuing to compete internationally.
''Moving to 30% target would result in at least a doubling of low-carbon markets compared to sticking to the current 20%. Much of the new growth would be in jobs-rich sectors like energy saving.''
And they said: ''Ducking the argument on 30% will put us in the global slow lane.
''Early action will provide our industries with a vital head start. That's why we believe that the move to 30% is right for Europe.
''It is a policy for jobs and growth, energy security and climate risk. Most of all it is a policy for Europe's future.''
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