Extracts from the news section of NATTA's journal Renew, issue 117, Jan- Feb 1999.

The Governments Renewable Energy review has been a long time coming because, it seems, of a lot of internal departmental wrangling and objections - not least from the Treasury. A Department of Trade and Industry official was quoted by Stewart Boyle in the FT (26/10/98) as saying that it was in danger of being 'buried by those who want to reduce targets and gut the subsidies’, while the Independent on Sunday (11/10/98) claimed that "Treasury civil servants are mounting a determined bid to stop ministerial plans for a rapid increase in the amount of energy Britain generates from the wind, water and the sun... The stand-off threatens to escalate into a row between Gordon Brown, the Chancellor of the Exchequer, and Peter Mandelson, the new Secretary of State for Trade and Industry."

Worse still, there were rumours that the whole idea of supporting renewables was being reconsidered- since they were not needed to meet the Kyoto target. A leaked confidential DTI paper prepared for the Governments external Energy Panel stated that 'early indications suggest that it may not take very much to meet the Kyoto target of a reduction of 12.5% in emissions of the basket of six greenhouse gasses in the commitment period 2008-2012', according to a report in Energy in Buildings and Industry (Eibi, Oct 1998).

Evidently this was not just because of the 'dash for gas', which in any case has now been slowed if not halted by the Government, but because of other savings, including reduced methane emissions from landfill sites. In addition, according to the Eibi, 'the further extension of life for the elderly MAGNOX nuclear stations is admitted to assist considerably'. We explore that point in more detail later.

But the DTI civil servants more general conclusion is even more startling. According to Eibi the DTI brief concluded 'Given that we may not have to do very much to meet our legal commitments... there is clearly a potential problem - if only presentationaly - in securing widespread agreement to push ahead with measures - particularly energy efficiency and renewables - which may not actually be needed'

Of course, although the UK is only legally obliged to make a 12.5 % cut, it has set it self its own target of a 20% cut - and achieving that would be much more onerous. Indeed some 250 MP's recently signed a motion calling for more action on this, and the DTI paper evidently accepted that 'we are clearly not on the right track to reach the domestic aim of a 20% cut'.

To be charitable, and leaving interdepartmental intrigues and biases aside, there was presumably a real problem in trying to produce a review of renewables when there were so many as yet unresolved issues in UK Energy Policy, not least the future of the ‘pool’ mechanism. How could the DTI specify the way future NFFO’s might be organised if there was no certainty that a ‘pool price’ could be used as reference point?

As we note later, the White paper proposed radical changes - but no details have yet emerged. And then there was Lord Marshall’s report on business and energy tax mechanisms, which suggested that it might be necessary to consider a carbon tax.

All that interacted with the renewables review. The message seems to be if you want an integrated policy, you have to take your time.

Even so the delay is getting a bit embarrassing. In December, the Government published its annual energy review under the title‘Transforming Markets’, which saw innovation in technology as ‘a key part of the solution to a sustainable energy policy’ It suggested that ‘improved technologies and processes such as renewable energy and clean coal technologies can give us the jobs of the future through the energy sources for the future - while winning export markets and pushing technologies forward’ but gave no hint as to when the renewable review might emerge. Nor did Energy Minister John Battle when he addressed the pre-Christmas gathering of the Solar Energy Society (see below) - all he mentioned by way of new commitments was that the new Scottish Renewable Order would be out shortly.

Lord Melchett, Executive Director of Greenpeace, speaking at a wind energy conference in Edinburgh, at which he argued the merits of offshore wind and wave, commented that ‘the continued delay in the renewable energy policy robs the UK of the potential for a sustainable, renewable jobs industry, and thousands of new jobs’

The UK Solar Energy Society gave Energy Minister John Battle a bit of a shock after his invited lecture to the society in December, by pushing the idea of solar heating strongly. Battle seems to have been won over by the solar PV lobby, but evidently had not really appreciated that solar heating was now also a strong contender - indeed it was ready to go immediately, if only it was given the right support.

As we report in our Technology section, there are now some quite large solar heating projects underway, although, as was pointed out forcefully during the discussion period after Battles address to the society, the fact that the full VAT was still charged on solar energy systems, but not on gas, made it very hard for solar to make much progress in the individual domestic house sector.

The large allocation under the fifth Non Fossil Fuel Obligation of 1177MW declared net capacity from 261 new renewable energy projects (see Renew 116) was generally welcomed as showing what renewables could do if given a chance - and as indicating that they had become increasingly cost effective.

However, the overall low average figure of 2.71p/kWh was in part due to the inclusion yet again of waste combustion projects, which are now running at an average of 2.43p/kWh, well below the national 'pool price' of 2.67p/kWh. Even leaving aside the fact that many environmentalist object to the inclusion of waste combustion, surely these projects should by now be able to go ahead without NFFO support? Or were they left in to keep the overall average NFFO price low - in effect subsidising some of the more expensive renewable projects? The inclusion of waste combustion, and the cross subsidy effect, would of course help increase the overall scale of the NFFO without incurring excessive costs, and that seems to have been a priority

The list of the 261 specific contracts under NFFO-5 is dominated by the large number of landfill gas schemes - 142 projects in all, totalling 314MW mostly around 1-2MW with a few larger ones. By contrast the waste combustion allocation might seem quite small -with only 29 projects - but they are larger scale than the landfill projects (typically 10-30MW), so the total capacity comes to 486MW.

While the NFFO has obviously helped stimulate renewables, the competitive bidding mechanism has its problems. According to Dr Catherine Mitchell from the Science Policy Research Unit at the University of Sussex, writing in Wind Direction (Oct 1998) it had ‘led to a situation where NFFO contracts, initially obtained by a developer, are then being taken over by a few large companies who are able to obtain finance at the cheapest rates.

Both small generators and smaller sites are pushed out’.

The contracts won by some of wind companies in the newly formed Renewable Generators Consortium, which has been set up for ex-NFFO projects, (see Renew 116) illustrate how competitive markets can work. According to a report in Wind Direction (Oct 1998) most of the wind supply companies have agreed tariffs with regional electricity companies in excess of 3p/kWh- which is higher than what they could have obtained under the current round of the NFFO- the average price for wind in NFFO-5 was 2.88p.

The process of opening up the UK electricity market to competition is now well underway, with consumers in various areas being offered a chance to choose who to buy power from, on a phased region by region postcode basis. So far the response has been fairly muted – despite predictions on one hand of a massive price cut and a switch by consumers to new suppliers, and on the other of market chaos, but no real change given consumers confusion.

But Greg Pulast, former energy adviser to Margaret Beckett, did try to stir things up with a blistering attack on the whole exercise, which he said was a sham (Guardian 3/9/98). Far from offering genuine price cuts and different suppliers, all that was really happening was that consumers were being asked to switch to new ‘billing’ companies, who simply sold you the same old stuff – basically from National Power and Power Gen – with a few discounts but no reduction in the actual price of power. Consumers will he said end up having to pay £726m of the £776m the change over has cost – for the new computer system. That’s £34 pa for a typical household – set against the £30 discount they might expect from the 12% price discount.

What really seemed to worry Pulast is that National Power and Power Gen would continue much as before, earning vast profits. What he seems to have ignored is the newly emerging green energy market. True it’s small (National Power and Power Gen still control 85% of the ‘hourly bid’ generation market) but it does offer an alternative source of power.

As concerns about climate change grow, companies in the fossil fuel extraction business are beginning to look to ways to reduce carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions without having to stop exploitation the reserves. As we discuss in our Technology section, one idea is to separate out the carbon dioxide and then store it back in the oil or gas wells, where it can actually help increase the efficiency of oil or gas extraction.

British Petroleum and Norway's government owned Statoil, the largest integrated oil companies in their respective countries, are working together to find ways of reducing energy consumption and disposing of CO2

According to BP, its project with Statoil would focus on:

"developing technology to separate carbon dioxide from gas turbine exhausts and disposing of it in an environmentally acceptable and economic manner."

BP has already set up its own internal carbon dioxide management project to look at various technological options. One such was to "recycle" carbon dioxide for enhanced oil recovery. A pilot project is under consideration at Schrader Bluff reservoir in Alaska. Meanwhile, Statoil is working on a project that would involve extracting carbon dioxide at Karstø, Norway, transporting it 240 kilometres by pipeline to the Sleipner area of the North Sea, and injecting it into the seabed. See also our report on Norway later.

Obviously it would be preferable to forget all about fossil fuels and get on with renewables, but while we are working towards that it makes sense to minimize the damage from fossil fuel use. Although sequestration is likely to be expensive, it may help, while, at the same time, its expense will make renewables all the more attractive as an alternative.

Carbon Sequestration' is a new buzz word in the energy field- it means absorbing or storing carbon dioxide gas so as to reduce global warming- and some people see trees as the obvious answer. However, David Hall from Kings College London is promoting the benefits of biomass not as a sink for carbon dioxide, but rather as a source of renewable power which will avoid the release of carbon dioxide from the combustion of fossil fuel.

A clear point for policy makers is that trees (and other forms of biomass) can act as carbon sinks but at maturity or at their optimum growth rate there must be plans to use the biomass as a source of fuel to offset fossil energies (or as very long-lived timber products). Otherwise the many years of paying to sequester and protect the carbon in trees will simply be lost as they decay and/or burn uncontrollably. Biomass has many advantages for an environmentally-friendly future but to obtain maximum benefit, trees (other than in primary forests) should be used as an energy source ( or long-lived product) at the end of their growing life.

David Hall

A new wave power station, six times the size of the existing one, is to be built on the island of Islay in the Inner Hebrides off the Atlantic coast of Scotland. David Ross reports on this important breakthrough .

What is particularly significant is that the station is to be built by a combination of academic wave researchers and the private sector: Queen's University, Belfast which invented and built the first 75kW station on Islay, which survived eight winters in the face of Atlantic seas, and Applied Research and Technology (A.R.T.), the company which built the ill-fated OSPREY.

Prof. Trevor Whittaker, the brain behind the plan, said: "We had carried out a great deal of academic research and knew we could make shoreline wave energy viable. A.R.T brought the business know-how and commercial development expertise which has resulted in the project’s emergence as an efficient, reliable and cost-effective way of generating electricity."

Financial backing is coming from the European Union in Brussels which is offering 1.44m Ecu (£940,000 sterling). Another £750,000 sterling is coming from private sources which are not being identified for the present. But it is known that the project is being supported by the biggest employer on the island, the Distillers Company which produces Scotch whisky. It is believed that they are ready to come in with money when the scheme is replicated. Professor Whittaker is looking ahead to producing a number of units on lslay alone and, once it demonstrates its efficiency, for other islands and coastal communities. He told me: "We are going for a plant that can be mass-produced - the bottom line is replication."

The new project is for a 500kW model known as a Limpet because it clings to the shoreline cliff. It will face directly into the Atlantic rollers (the previous one, of 75kW, was in a slightly sheltered site). It will be an Oscillating Water Column, which means that, as the waves rise and fall at the entrance, a pocket of air is pushed up and down. It drives an air turbine which is coupled to a generator. Work started last year, and should be completed within a year. That was the good news. At almost the same time, A.R.T. was given the bad news. The Irish Government held a competition for a new wave power station near-shore (which is a step beyond the onshore one on Islay). It was for a 15-year power purchase contract and infrastructure grant. It was judged by the Energy Technology Support Unit (ETSU) at Harwell, with Tom Thorpe as the scientist judging the entries. The winner was A.R.T.

But the European Commission (the civil service of the European Union) discovered a new obstacle: its "Monitoring Committee of the Economic Infrastructure Operational Programme" found a bureaucratic objection. It turned down the project because it would need financial support for a transmission line to take electricity to the grid. This was always a necessary part of the deal. How else did Brussels imagine that the electricity could be delivered?

The managing director of A.R.T., Allan Thomson, said: "This is a Catch-22 situation for us. We are delighted to have won the Irish competition but disappointed that the EU do not share ETSU and the lrish government’s view of the technology. It does seem a pity that funding is not available to help with projects which have been independently assessed as able to make a substantial contribution, particularly given the vast and important lrish (wave) resource."

This is mild compared with the remarks being made by wave energy supporters who have encountered strong opposition over the years from vested interests representing other energy sources, particularly nuclear. They do not doubt that this hostility has played a role behind the scenes in Brussels. They intend to continue the fight.

David Ross

The Governments White Paper on Energy, which reviews power producing options and electricity trading arrangements, was published last October, and proposes a radical programme of reform of the the Electricity Pool - with the aim of 'removing distortions in the electricity market and putting downward pressure on prices'.

As Energy Minister John Battle had already indicated in the consultation document (see Renew 113) the new mechanisms would be designed to ensure security of supplies, transparent prices, and a market which is competitive. However, as Battle pointed out at the launch of the White paper, 'further work is needed on these during the implementation stage' and 'the Government will bring forward legislation to support the changes'. He added: "Our review estimates wholesale electricity price cuts of 10 per cent and more are possible. And we need a market which gives a fair chance to competing fuels."

As foreshadowed in an earlier announcement (see Renew 115) Combined Heat and Power came out well from the review, and renewables are not forgotten, although the details of how they are to be treated in future were left to the DTI's renewables review. The clamp on the dash for gas remains. As the DTI noted , otherwise we could end up with gas supplying 60% of electricity by 2003.

The White Paper "Conclusions of The Review of Energy Sources for Power Generation and Government response to fourth and fifth Reports of the Trade and Industry Committee", Cm 4071, cost £17.85, and is available from The Stationery Office, The Publications Centre, PO Box 276, London SW8 5DT. Tel:0171 873 0011. The full text is at   http://www.dti.gov.uk   We will be reviewing it in Renew 118.

The Government has appointed Callum McCarthy as the new energy regulator, taking over from the separate gas and electricity regulators and overseeing the combined work of OFFER and OFGAS.

The Severn Tidal Power Group, a consortium of major UK construction firms, has been trying to resuscitate the idea of building a tidal barrage on the Severn Estuary. STPG submitted evidence on this to the Government Power Station review, arguing that the large capital cost (£10 billion) could be offset by the non-energy benefits – carbon dioxide abatement, employment and the enablement of new marine leisure activities and tourism.

A similar line was taken by Steve Taylor from Sir Robert McAlpine, one of the main companies in the STPG industrial consortium. Writing in ‘Civil Engineering’, the Proceedings of the Institution of Civil Engineers 126 (August 1998), he calls on the Government to support a private-public funding scheme, with the public element being justified by the ‘social’ benefits.

He is concerned about global warming and fears that, with the collapse of the UK nuclear expansion programme, there will be a shortfall in non-fossil power which wind, solar and biomass will not be able to fill – in which case gas/CCGT will increasingly dominate. He sees wind power as likely to be limited by environmental objections and its inherent intermittence. Even hydro is seen as variable – the lack of rainfall in 1996 evidently reduced output by nearly 40%, and this could get worse if and when global warming lifts off seriously.

So the answer is the 8.6 GW tidal barrage – which could supply 17,000 Gwh pa or about 6% of UK electricity. That, and a return to nuclear – which he seems to see as the most environmentally sound option if not in the UK then elsewhere. ‘The world cannot afford to be without it, even if, at present, the UK cannot afford it’.

One of the reasons why both the Severn tidal barrage and further nuclear plants were ruled out under the Conservative Government was, of course, the privatisation of the electricity supply industry. This made public investment in projects like this unlikely, and provided more lucrative options for the private sector – namely gas/CCGT.

It’s a little amusing to see someone from McAlpines, a company well known in the past for its support of the Conservatives, now asking new Labour to undo some of the damage – by reconsidering public investment. As Taylor notes, prior to privatisation, Nuclear Electric were asking for a £1bn subsidy for the construction of second (double sized) Pressurised Water Reactor at Sizewell, while the STPG suggested that a 1p/kWh ‘green penny’ subsidy would be sufficient to support a viable public-private joint venture on the Severn Barrage. Big technologies like this clearly appeal to Civil Engineers, and companies like McAlpines have been the mainstay of the nuclear programme in the past – as well as advocates of the Barrage. It seems unlikely that nuclear will make a come back, but it is conceivable that the barrage could.

After all it would be the UK’s single largest non-fossil fuel plant. Of course, quite apart from the economics, there are environmental problems - blocking off an estuary with an eleven mile long barrage is bound to have an impact, although some of the impacts could be positive. Strong opposition from some environmental groups is however likely, and certainly the pros and cons would need careful analysis – once again! The Barrage concept is probably one of the most assessed technological proposals of all time. But perhaps more important is the matching of the Barrage’s output to the grid and to energy demand patterns. Since privatisation, the whole emphasis in energy supply has shifted away from large power stations meeting base load, backed up by ‘spinning reserve’ and a few peak demand plants, to a more decentralised system of smaller plants embedded in the power system.

Some power engineers are less than confident that the latter system will prove robust and ‘keep the light on’ all the time. But equally some power engineers point out that the Severn Barrage would only produce great slabs of power (8.6 GW flat out) on a lunar cyclic pattern unrelated to the regular daily and yearly patterns of consumer demand. Most of the time its output would not be needed, and some of the time it would not be able to produce power when it was needed. Two-way turbines, and pumped storage are options which could help improve the matching of supply output to consumer load to some extent. But not that much - low lead pumped storage is not very efficient.

Longer term it might be possible to use spare output power to generate hydrogen – for storage or use as an alternative to, or and mixed with, natural gas. But for the moment for most people large barrage schemes sound like a ‘blast from the past’. At some point, the argument goes, they may be a worthwhile addition to the renewable portfolio, but for the present the money could probably be better spent on the other renewables including tidal current technology, and on energy conservation.

PRASEG, the Parliamentary Renewable and Sustainable Energy Group, held a Conference on Sustainable Energy on Nov 5th, asking ‘what progress is the government making? Alexi Clarke reports.

Will the Government achieve the 10% renewables by 2010 target ? Not at this rate it seems. Michael Meacher and John Battle spoke for the government and, while their hearts are in the right place, they seem unwilling to take the necessary ‘tough’ measures, such as an energy tax / credits trading.

In contrast to the focussed and pertinent presentations on policy options by speakers, the ministers fell back on old ground, citing achievements and failing to answer such direct questions as when the Renewables Review would finally appear. A worrying tendency to review everything simultaneously and endlessly, while hoping that it can all be done without spending much money, was displayed. The much vaunted win-win of a policy shift to renewables and energy efficiency can be overplayed.

Apparently bogged down in the overwhelming complexity of deregulation, and responses to climate change, they may end up with too little too late. However, Battle seemed to accept Greenpeace's view when he called the 10% target ‘relatively modest’, though even this target won't be reached without action.

Alexi Clarke

We will be reporting on the Conference in detail in Renew 118.

It all seems to be happening in Norway at the moment. Norway has massive hydro resources as well as a large share of North Sea gas, but it is beginning to get worried about the future, security of supply and over reliance on single sources. Hence its interest in the past in wave energy, and its more recent interest in wind power. However not every one is convinced about the merits of the latter.

The official Norwegian Water Resources and Energy Administration (NVE), recently sent a delegation to Denmark to study "the lessons of experience" in relation to windpower, and some of their findings have been reported in the NVE house magazine Vann & Energi (Water & Energy). They are none too flattering.

The report states that the Danish initiative, launched 15 years ago, has suffered from "inadequate controls" and "massive and unrestrained funding," which in turn have led to "serious environmental effects, insufficient production, high production costs" and wind parks built at insufficiently windy locations.

According to the NVE, the main success of Danish investment in windpower would appear to be "the foundation of an industry producing wind mills".

NVE's main focus is hydropower, but it has nevertheless supported a Norwegian windpower initiative by a local power company, which was awarded state funding to build a 90-metre-high wind turbine, Norway's largest, on the island of Nærøy.

The NVE's Asle Sefors says: "If Norway is now to enter an era of windpower, the goal must be to produce the most possible energy for the lowest possible cost and with minimal environmental effects. Even if wind turbines can be less environmentally harmful than other forms of power production that does not mean they are positively environment-friendly.

The aesthetic blight of one windmill is on a par with that of a 420kV power line mast. However, the aesthetic effects per kilowatt-hour produced become less as the park becomes larger. Avoiding areas of natural beauty, outdoor recreation or housing will be a central concern."

Meanwhile, a newspaper advertisement in the Norwegian national newspaper Aftenposten raised a few eyebrows by offering ‘CO2 emissions quota for sale’, in return for financial help in modernising a coal-fired power installation in an eastern European country. This is believed to be the first such offer to be made in Europe.

The newspaper ad claimed that: "For Norway and Norwegian businesses, quota trading will be one way of fulfilling the Kyoto agreement's goal of reductions in the emissions of six climate gases from 2008-2012."

According to an expert quoted by Aftenposten, one-third of Norwegian emissions reductions could be achieved through buying quotas from other countries.

Contacts: Aftenposten ( http://www.aftenposten.no ),tel: +47 22 86 30 00.

Emission trading and carbon taxes are currently very controversial issues in Norway

(nearly as controversial as the radioactive pollution from Sellafield!). Last June that even led to resignation threats by the Norwegian prime minister and a vote of confidence in Norway's parliament, which resuscitated a controversial plan to extend the country's system of carbon dioxide taxes.

And finally, Norsk Hydro have come up with a novel $1.3billion plan to build two power stations in Norway which will take natural gas from the North sea, convert this methane gas by conventional chemical reformation, to CO2 and Hydrogen. The hydrogen will then be used to run a gas turbine to produce electricity, while the CO2 will be pumped back down bore-holes into Oil reservoirs in order to drive oil up the production wells and improve the production ratios of existing oil fields. The net result should be to significantly reduce overall CO2 emissions compared with just burning the methane to generate power.

"This new technology may change both the way Norwegian goals for reducing CO2 emissions are met as well as the future electricity supply outlook for the country," according to Norsk Hydro's president and CEO, Egil Myklebust.

For details of the scheme see:

There's also a lot going on in Austria these days- particularly since it now has the Presidency of the EU Council of Ministers. Austria is at the top of the league in terms of renewable energy use in Europe - with more than 24% of its gross primary energy coming from renewable sources. Much of this is from biomass, but it also many direct solar projects, including plans for 1500 solar houses in the Pitchling area of Linz.

Sweden is developing what will, they say, be the worlds largest offshore wind farm, near the site of the giant new bridge linking Copenhagen and Malmo. It will have 37 of the new 1.5 MW wind turbines - enough to provide 210GWh pa, 13% of Malmo's power.

Italy currently obtains around 6% of its energy from renewable sources, mostly hydro (72%) and biomass (17%), and in compliance with the EU target of a 12% contribution by 2010, it is planning to expand the scale significantly, and in some areas some very ambitious targets seem credible. For example, the Regional Energy Plan for Tuscany is aiming at 23%, taking into account the geothermal potential in the region.

Italy's first National Conference on Renewable Energy Sources was held in June, organised by the National Agency for New Technologies, Energy and the Environment (ENEA). It was designed as one of the preliminary events preceding the National Energy and Environment Conference in Rome in November, and the development of a National White Paper on Renewable Energy Sources.

Some 3,800 MW of renewables was authorised by the Government between 1992 and 1995, but only a third has actually been installed. So setting things going was seen as the first priority, and a new programme is planned, aiming to install 2800 MW. There will, it seems, be a series of staged sub programmes or "packages": the first "package" will be for wind power, which foresees the installation of 650 MW for an estimated investment of 1,200 billion Lire. Currently, there is only 100 MW of wind power installed in Italy, but ENEL maintains that the potential exists for the installation of around 2000 - 3000MW. An NFFO type mechanism is likely to be adopted to push things on.

Secondly the aim is to also push on with technologies, such as thermal solar and photovoltaics, not covered in the existing programme.

The overall aim was to install 7-9,000 MW by 2010, which would cost 25-30,000 billion lire, (12-15 billion ECU). 3 billion lire has already been allocated for experimentation with integrated photovoltaic systems for buildings.

More details were put on these plans when in Oct., the Italian Government unveiled a consultative Green paper on renewables, which suggested that renewable contribution could be doubled by 2010, and outlined a programme of state funding of up to IL1,100bn by 2010, supported from a new carbon tax, as part of a IL40 trillion programme drawing in private sector funding, with the end result being the creation of some 100,000 new jobs.

The carbon tax, or 'CO2 emissions tax', had already been announced in the Italian budget, and involves fuel excise duties being raised every year by, possibly, up to a cumulative 10% over the next five years, as part of a new effort to meet the threat of global warming. 20m tonnes of carbon dioxide emissions should be saved over the period 1999-2004.

Following in the same style as the UK DETR's plan in the new White paper on Transport, revenues from the tax will not simply go into the treasury, but will be earmarked to support environmental projects, including both transport projects, and it seems renewable energy projects.

The Green paper, which was drafted by ENEA, concludes that Italy could double renewable energy production from 12.7 million tonnes oil equivalent (mtoe) currently to 24 mtoe by 2010, although doubling production would not double the share of renewable energies due to projected growth in total energy consumption. But it would help Italy to meet the 7% emission reduction target set under the Kyoto protocol.

The green paper strongly supports the new renewable energy technologies, and particularly wind power. The green paper, proposes that this should increase to 3,000MW by 2010, which is equivalent to over half the total currently installed across Europe.

There are also proposals for a major move to biomass electricity production, from 172MW of capacity to 2,500MW in 2010. But hydroelectric power, would be more or less left at its current levels.

Solar PV is surprisingly, given Italy's climate, treated with some caution.

Contacts: ENEA ( http://www.sede.enea.it ), tel: +39 0636271; Italian environment ministry, tel: +39 06 57221.

Solar Campaign 2000 is a new German industry-led initiative aiming to increase the use of passive solar water heating in domestic and public buildings. Its target is to double the German passive solar market by 2003, and by 2010, it is hoped that annual carbon dioxide emission savings of 2.5m tonnes could be achieved by displacing electric or fossil fuel powered water heating.

Several manufacturers of passive solar equipment have joined the group, as well as Baum, a network for environmentally conscious firms.

The campaign should benefit from a recent decision by the government to extend an existing tax incentive for purchasers of passive solar water heaters until the end of 2000.

Contacts: Baum, tel: +49 40 810 101; Eurosolar http://www.eurosolar.org, tel: +49 228 362 373.

The follow up to the 1997 UN Climate Change Conference in Kyoto, was held in Buenos Aires in November. The main focus of this new meeting – officially called the Fourth Conference of Parties or COP-4, was expected to be on the details of the‘protocol’ agreed at COP-3 at Kyoto – and in particular the idea of ‘emission trading’. But it wasn't just the technical details that were at stake. The whole Kyoto agreement looked imperiled by the continued opposition of the US Congress.

In the run up to the Buenos Aires meeting, the US Congress became increasingly hostile to anything that seemed related to the Kyoto agreement on Climate Change, and even seemed to be trying to undermine existing commitments to renewable energy. Ken Bossong, Executive Director of the SUN DAY Campaign."Blind, ideological opposition to the Kyoto protocol has made many in Congress willing to lash out at anything even remotely associated with it regardless of the consequences for human health and the environment."

Meanwhile in Europe it was a different story altogether. The EU remains strongly committed to the Kyoto protocol, and has been resisting any watering down of its provisions. In particular it has been concerned to block up any loopholes - like the so called 'hot air trading' problem. Countries like the USA could buy emission permits from Russia, which has lots to spare because its industrial activity has been much reduced since the 1990 base line year used in the Kyoto protocol. So there would then be no need for the USA to make many actual cuts in emissions. To try to avoid this, the EU proposed a limit to international emission trading- or rather it proposed that a minimum domestic reduction be set which all developed (Annex 1) countries must achieve without resorting to emissions trading - these should only be ‘supplementary to domestic action’. At one stage Austria, who had the EU Presidency, wanted the so called ‘concrete ceiling’ on international emissions trading to be set at 50% for countries committed to reducing emissions and just 2.5% for countries stabilising or allowed to increase.

However, the European Union gradually moved to a more flexible approach, in part because there were fears that, if they did not, then there would be no way of getting US support of Kyoto. Certainly the USA was pretty intransigent, arguing at one stage that ‘supplemental’ could mean anything up to 99%! Other US commentators were slightly more subtle - adopting essentially a ' free market' line. Writing in the Financial Times (20/10/98) two US Government Officials argued in favour of unrestricted international emission trading as a key method for reaching the Kyoto targets, and claimed that 'limits on trading would greatly increase administrative costs, be extremely difficult to implement and generally make it much more expensive to address climate change'.

However how 'hot air trading' and other loop holes are to be avoided was less clear. One idea was to shift the datum year from 1990 to 1995, presumably to avoid the ‘hot air trading’ problem, and also to give the USA a bit more leeway. But that would put the UK on the spot, by neutralising some of the gains made since 1990 in terms of emission cuts as a result of the ‘dash for gas’.

Greenpeace, the European Wind Energy Association and the Danish Forum for Energy and Development launched a report outlining an ambitious new proposal for obtaining 10% of the worlds electricity from windturbines by 2017 at the Buenos Aires Conference.

The US looked like it might be able to get off the hook in terms of greenhouse emissions as a result of a bit of research published by Princeton University, who found that forests in the USA actually absorbed about the same amount of carbon dioxide as the USA produced (1.7 billion tonnes pa). Forests in Eurasia by contrast were far less effective.

So what finally emerged at Buenos Aires? With a recession underway, both in the West and in some of the key newly developed countries, perhaps unsurprisingly in the end the result of the negotiations was something of a fudge.

After the final all night session almost collapsed in disarray, discussion of many of the most contentious issues was postponed to the next meeting next year - and we will evidently have to wait until COP-6 in two years time for resolution of the issues surrounding emission trading, Joint Implementation and the Clean Development Mechanisn. The key issue of whether existing commitments to cut emissions are sufficient to protect the climate was avoided and the final agreement, after two weeks of negotiations, was essentially a list of 142 unresolved items and an outline agreement on a workplan for further work.

There was minor progress on some details (e.g there will be a workshop on the reduction of emissions of HFC’s - powerful greenhouse gases) and there were discussions on compensation for countries effected by Climate Change and the cost of responding to it. But otherwise it was all pretty depressing.

Greenpeace complained that short term economic interests had dominated, and warned that it was ‘frustrating for businesses keen to take advantage of the opportunities to be had in the switch from fossils fuels to renewable energy technologies.’

Friends of the Earth called it an ‘inaction plan’, while WWF though it had been a ‘trade fair wrangling over how to keep the fossil fuel industry alive and burning’.

The international pressure group GLOBE put a lot of work in trying to rescue the situation - pressing for the so-called 'Contract and Converge' approach, but it seems to no avail, all we've got is ‘fudge and delay’. The Kyoto Protocol still lives, and the fudge did allow the US to sign the Treaty at long last - but the US Senate still has to ratify it.

The Protocol sets an overall total reduction target for developed countries of 5.2%, compared to 1990 levels of greenhouse gas emissions in the period 2008-2012, with the EU and 11 others (mostly Eastern Europe) to reduce by 8% on 1990 levels, US by 7%, Japan and Canada by 6%, Russia, Ukraine and New Zealand to stabilise emissions, Norway to increase emissions by 1%, Australia to increase by 8% and Iceland to increase by 10%.

Although the EU’s overall emission reduction target is 8%, some EU countries have been allowed to go for far less, while others have opted for more. The UK has agreed to cut emissions by 12.5% by 2008 to 2012, but it also has a national target of a 20% cut in carbon dioxide emissions by 2010.

The overall aim of the Governments strategy is 'to develop a balanced package of measures which shares responsibility between all sectors of the economy and builds on other Government reviews and initiatives - the Integrated Transport White Paper, review of energy sources for power generation and the work of Lord Marshall's Task Force on the use of economic instruments to improve the use of energy by business.'

One of the Government's key aims is to 'focus efforts on those measures which will bring wider benefits: warmer homes, a more sustainable transport system, more energy efficient industry and the opportunities and advantages for jobs and business from developing and marketing new technologies and processes. This aim has been endorsed by business.'

As we noted in Renew 114, the Advisory Committee on Business and the Environment has said it is confident that if business responds to the climate change challenge now, it can manage and control the process in a cost-effective way with long term solutions which maximise the gains.

And as evidence that this sort of commitment may emerge, in Sept. last year, in the run up to the Buenos Aires meeting, BP announced an initiative to help tackle the threat of climate change. The initiative, announced by BP Chairman Sir John Browne in a speech at Yale commits BP to cut their emissions of carbon dioxide worldwide by 10% and launches a system of emissions trading within the company.

Responding to the speech, Environment Protection Minister Mr Meacher said: "It is very encouraging to see a major multi-national oil company take up the climate change challenge in this way. This initiative by BP challenges industry to clean up their act and, just as importantly, allows politicians, due to meet in Buenos Aires in November, to provide the framework industry will need to reduce climate change gases."

Not to be outdone, Shell also joined in, with a commitment to cut its global emissions of greenhouse gases by at least 10% from 1990 levels by 2002. Shell say that the initiative is intended to give the company a leading position in the post-Kyoto process. Shell says it has already shaved 5% off its estimated 1990 emissions and it now hopes to double the reduction by 2002. Subsequently it hopes to be able to constrain emission, although it warns that that would depend on factors such as business performance, divestments or acquisitions. Even so, it intends to ensure that emissions in 2010 will not be above the average Kyoto commitment of a 5.2% cut on 1990 levels.

Contacts: Shell ( http://www.shell.com ), tel: 0171 9341234.

In the run up to Buenos Aires the DETR produced a new consultation paper on Climate Change. ‘Warmer homes, better transport and more efficient companies’ were some of the benefits the UK would reap if we met our targets, according to John Prescott, who said that he wanted to start a national debate on how the UK can meet both the legally binding target from Kyoto and the domestic goal of a 20 % cut by 2010.

Mr Prescott said: "The UK has set the pace in international discussions on climate change. Now we are demonstrating our commitment to action at home." He added "There has been far too much talk of the burdens associated with meeting our targets and far too little about the opportunities. The debate I am initiating today is about gain, not pain! Energy efficient companies are more competitive. Better transport systems will only be good for our economy, and our society. And well-insulated homes will be more comfortable and cheaper to live in. There could also be new jobs and new opportunities for UK firms in the emerging environmental technology market. In future, it's the businesses that gain the edge in producing quality lean and clean products that will be winners in the global market place."

However, although he felt that we can and must achieve our climate change targets, he was 'determined that we will not introduce measures that will damage our competitiveness, nor take action that will have unacceptable social costs.'

The consultation document claims that the legally binding 12.5% target is well within reach and that a 20% reduction in CO2 is achievable and outlines the main policy options for reducing greenhouse gas emissions in the energy supply, business, transport, domestic, agriculture and public sectors.

On current projections it says that the UK is forecast to be about 10% below 1990 emission levels in 2010. This includes the impact of some policies introduced since the election and the new National Road Traffic Forecasts, which imply a reduction of up to about 3% on previous projections. Even so, about 40% of the overall savings needed would have to come from the transport sector.

Emissions from most sectors are, it says, currently on a downward trend. This is partly because of the switch to less carbon intensive fuels in the electricity generation sector, but also due to measures in the current climate change programme. However, after 2000 emissions of carbon dioxide start to rise again. The DTI’s new projections, reflecting other developments, including the conclusions of the White Paper on Power Generation, these will be published in an new DTI Energy paper EP 67, which will update EP 65.

Comments on the DETR Climate Change paper are invited by 12 Feb. Copies of the paper are available from DETR Free Literature, PO Box No 236, Wetherby S3 7NB, tel: 0870 1226 236, fax: 0870 1226 237. It is also available on the internet at: http://www.detr.gov.uk

The Government evidently plans to further extend the operating life of its MAGNOX reactors to 2011, in order to keep to its carbon dioxide emission reduction targets and also presumably so as to save money. British Nuclear Fuels (BNF), the new owners, are understandably keen (see Guardian 4/9/98) especially since that they can presumably continue to earn money reprocessing the fuel.

The MAGNOX reactors were the so called 'workhorses of the nuclear industry', supplying 8% of UK electricity, but they are now seriously old, dating from the 1960s. However, that means that they have long since paid off their construction costs, so that any further power they can produce is cheap, at least by nuclear standards. Not surprisingly, their original 'use by' dates have already been extended, although some are now being shut down and a decommissioning programme is underway.

The first to be shut down was Calder Hall at Sellafield (ne Wind scale) which was the first MAGNOX design to operate, but was set up, in 1956, primarily to produce plutonium for the bomb, as was Chaplecross (1958) in Scotland. The first of the 9 (more or less) civil MAGNOX, was at Berkeley on the Severn estuary. It started up in 1962. It is now being decommissioned, but just down the river there's Oldbury, which was one of the last, commissioned in 1968. Although, like all the others, downrated, it's still ticking over, producing (when we visited last summer) 320 MW or so. That interestingly is about the same as the total wind power generation capacity now installed in the UK. Obviously the wind turbines won't produce 320MW continuously, but then again neither will Oldbury: there were an awful lot of signs around Oldbury imploring staff to try to avoid plant 'outages' i.e unplanned shutdowns.

And of course power is not all Olbury produces. Like all the MAGNOX reactors, the magnesium alloy canister used to contain the uranium fuel rods adds to the problems of reprocessing - when the spent fuel ends up at Sellafield, the cans have to be stripped off before work can begin separating the plutonium from the other radioactive materials (which is what, for good or ill, reprocessing is all about). That generates a lot of waste. Indeed reprocessing MAGNOX fuel is by far the largest source of nuclear waste, much more than that from the next generation Advanced Gas-cooled Reactors, despite the fact that MAGNOX plants generate less power.

A visit to Oldbury is well worth the effort - the visitors centre is free, glossy and well resourced (at taxpayers expense presumably, since the MAGOX have remained in the public sector). It's full of high tech displays including video's which dismiss renewables as unlikely to be very relevant because of their space requirements. There is also much talk of the nuclear waste repository under Sellafield as the final answer- although of course this project is now on hold, and there is still no plan for the long term storage of nuclear waste.

After all the glossy hi-tech images, the MAGNOX plant itself comes as something of a shock: it is showing its age, with peeling paintwork and an antique atmosphere pervading the 1960's neo-modern architecture. 1960's nostalgia may have its place, but somehow they seem unlikely to be candidates for preservation as industrial archaeological exhibitions. Take a look yourself.

BNF now runs the plants on the governments behalf, but there have recently been suggestions that BNF would be privatised. That would make it even more commercially attractive to keep them running longer.

However, there are problems looming for BNF. The new OSPAR agreement on emissions, accepted after pressure was put on the UK government, implies that emissions from Sellafield will have to be cut dramatically - the aim being to get levels 'to near zero' by 2010. One result could be that reprocessing of MAGNOX fuel will have to be halted, or at least completed, by 2010. That in turn means that the MAGNOX plants will have to close by 2009, if there is to be sufficient time for their fuel to be dealt with.

And even after closure, problems still remain. The Trawsfynydd Magnox plant, on the shores of a lake in Snowdonia, has been shut down following concerns about the reliability of welds and it is to be decommisioned. As part of this process there are plans for a 'temporary' shed (a 'reduced height safestore') to be constructed to contain the rump of the reactor - once the ancillary equipment and buildings have been removed. Then, in 135 years time, when the core has cooled a bit more, it will be removed and, in theory at least, the site will be returned to its original state. However, some opponents of this scheme fear that, when it comes to 2136, it will simply be entombed - covered over and left.

The delayed dismantling approach obviously saves money - evidently it would cost £700m to fully dismantle it straight away as opposed to £200m if it is left for 135 years, in part because its easier (and of course safer) to work with lower levels of radioactivity. And you don't have to be an expert in discounting future costs to realise that a relatively small amount of money put aside regularly over 135 years can easily provide the sum needed. Delay also seeks to avoid potentially contentious issues of long term waste storage. But WANA, the Welsh Anti Nuclear Alliance, argue that, if it is actually going to be entombed rather than removed fully, then in effect the site is now being designated as a long term nuclear waste disposal facility- and the geology is completely wrong for that. WANA are also concerned with the levels of radioactivity in the lake- especially since there are plans for it to be re- opened up to leisure use.

Greenpeace have claimed that some of the land around the nuclear fuel reprocessing plant at Sellafield in Cumbia is as radioactive as land in the 'exclusion' zone around the stricken Chernobyl nuclear reactor in the Ukraine. While an area of 30km radius around Chernobyl is prohibited for people and any agricultural activity, there are no such restrictions around Sellafield.

"Sellafield is a slow-motion Chernobyl, an accident played out over the last four decades," said Greenpeace . Samples of mud and soil taken 7 miles from Sellafield by Greenpeace were analysed by the University of Bremen and the Hamburg Environment Office. The University also analysed samples from within the Chernobyl exclusion zone, from distances between 800 metres to 2 kms from the nuclear reactor. Some levels of contamination were comparable , others were found to be higher at Sellafield, by 23 times for americium-241 - a highly radioactive, carcinogenic substance.

Renew 117 takes a look at sustainable innovation, with a Feature article by Dave Elliott based on a paper presented to the 'Constructing Tomorrow' Conference organised by UWE in Bristol last year.

The full printed 30 page bimonthly Renew journal can be obtained from NATTA, the Network for Alternative Technology and Technology Assessment, on subscription for £12 pa for students/unwaged, otherwise its £18pa, payable to 'NATTA'.

Further details from NATTA, c/o EERU, Open University, Milton Keynes, MK 7 6AA Tel: 01908 65 4638 (24 hrs) Fax: 01908 65 4052 (24 hrs). Also see http://www-tec.open.ac.uk/eeru/natta/rol.html

S.J.Dougan@open.ac.uk

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