The 'free' market right continue their attack on renewable energy

I've posted recently about how the 'free' market right have been at the forefront of the climate change denial movement through shadowy groups like the Global Warming Policy Foundation (GWPF), and are actively undermining the fight against climate change. Now we hear from the Telegraph that more than 100 Tory MPs have written to the PM asking him to end subsidies for windfarms. Not only are these subsidies, which help the renewable energy sector to grow and compete, under attack, but there are also increasing objections to windfarms in the UK.

Lets deal with the subsidies first; because relatively cheap coal and gas are still available and the renewables energy sector is still developing, subsidies are needed to enable the widespread installation of energy derived from wind and solar. The solar industry recently created 25,000 much needed jobs in the UK, which are now under threat because the government has attempted to reduce subsidies. The irony is that none of those on the 'free' market right seem to have any objection to subsidies for nuclear power, which is not only uneconomic and produces a toxic waste problem, but has needed subsidies in the UK from day one. Research in the USA shows that all energy sources have received energy subsidies in the past hundred years with oil and gas receiving the highest subsidy of all. Wind power provides the cheapest form of renewable energy. Its critics claim it is intermittent and unreliable but these myths have been debunked according to this post by Damian Carrington in the Guardian. Furthermore, it has been calculated that;

"The best wind farms in the world already produce power as economically as coal, gas and nuclear generators; the average wind farm will be fully competitive by 2016".

And in the UK the costs of switching to low carbon energy will be no greater than continuing with business as usual.

I accept that people have a perfect right to object to wind farms being built in their locality, and there are some legitimate concerns about windfarms being built too close to dwellings, and the possible health risks form being subjected to noise. But we need to embrace this new cleaner technology for the sake of the future. I wonder how many people objected when the railways were being built in Britain?

Finally, you have to ask - why is it that climate change has become a left vs right issue over the past decade or so? Why do right-wingers like Nigel Lawson, of the GWPF, Tory MPs, and Ruth Lea seem to think that all environmentalists are lefties and climate change is a left-wing plot to bring about an eco-socialist world? Why do they object so strongly? The answer is simple - capitalism and corporate profits. The 'free' market right have recognised that climate change is a potential threat to established big businesses and capitalist accumulation, which relies on compound growth. They fear that adaptation to climate change and a low carbon, lower energy, lower consumption future will kill capitalist expansion, and they are probably right. If you want to find out more read Naomi Klein's excellent article on Capitalism vs the Climate. I'll just finish with this quote which sums up why this battle is being fought so fiercely:

"The bottom line is that an ecological crisis that has its roots in the overconsumption of natural resources must be addressed not just by improving the efficiency of our economies but by reducing the amount of material stuff we produce and consume. Yet that idea is anathema to the large corporations that dominate the global economy, which are controlled by footloose investors who demand ever greater profits year after year. We are therefore caught in the untenable bind of, as Jackson puts it, "trash the system or crash the planet."

The most dangerous man in Britain?

Who could this man be? David Cameron? Bob Crow? No. For me, Cameron is certainly number two but the most dangerous man in Britain is a man who was once very well known, and even now he still makes the odd appearance on Newsnight and Radio 4. This man is Nigel Lawson and he is the mouthpiece, or more formally Chair and founder, of something called the Global Warming Policy Foundation (GWPF). The GWPF - very grand title that - sounds like a bunch of concerned academics and citizens who want to spread the word about the dangers of climate change, but its exactly the opposite. It is a cover for heavyweight climate change deniers.

Before I say more about the GWPF lets have a look at Nigel Lawson's track record. His claim to public prominence comes from being Margaret Thatcher's Chancellor of the Exchequer for the period 1983-89, and a former Secretary of State for Energy. He was responsible for the notorious 'Lawson Boom' in the 1980s, substantial tax cuts for the better off, and massive deregulation of the financial sector . Although unemployment fell from a peak of 3 million, the boom lead to crippling interest rates of 15%. So, as deregulator-in-chief of the financial sector in the UK he already has much to answer for in terms of the current economic crisis we face.

The most dangerous man in Britain

But it was his tenure as Secretary of State for Energy which gives us a clue as to his new role as climate change denier-in-chief. The GWPF refuses to admit who its financial backers are but its not hard to imagine that some of them might have interests in energy generation. The GWPFs biggest coup was its involvement in 'climategate', when emails from the University of East Anglia's Climatic Research unit were hacked, and Lawson called for an independent inquiry.

Despite the fact that he has been widely critised and his comments have been described as demonstrably inaccurate, Lawson shows no sign of giving up. In fact I heard him as I was driving to work only the other morning extolling the virtues of fracking, pooh-poohing renewables as uneconomic - though this suggests otherwise -  and once again denying climate change saying "that there has been no global warming whatever so far this century". You can listen to it here.

Nigel Lawson is lucky enough to be nearly 80 years old. He won't be around when global temperatures have risen by 2 degrees to witness the harm that it will cause to people and the planet. He's all right jack, but we won't be, if his antics succeed in delaying the mitigation of climate change. In my view he is probably the most dangerous man in Britain.

So, have we screwed up Planet Earth?

The simple answer is no, the Earth will be around for a long time after we have perished, but it is beginning to look like we may have screwed up the planet as far as humans are concerned. The latest data from the International Energy Authority paints a disturbing picture. It seems that we are in danger of passing the point where we can prevent a global temperature rise of 2oC and damaging climate change, because we are continuing to build fossil fuel power stations, and that we have only five years left to do something about it.

We are always being told that capitalism can do great things and that the market can solve all our problems. But it is clear that the market is responsible for this particular problem. Its not just the demand for energy that is at the root of climate change but the fact that the energy companies are completely wedded to fossil fuel extraction. We could have gone down the renewable energy route years ago, putting ourselves in a much better position now. But what was the energy companies response to a shortage of easy to extract fossil fuels? Go for the harder and much more environmentally damaging fossil fuels like tar sands oil and shale gas from fracking. With capitalism the desire for profit obviously outweighs the desire to prevent irreversible climate change - here is a quote from Oil and Energy Investor:

Shale is no longer "the future" of natural gas... It's now... And fracking is paying-off in high profits for those who know how to take advantage of it. The reason is simple: Old natural gas wells around the globe are running dry, replaced by new shale wells. 

So now we know. It should come as no surprise, because capitalists put profit before people and the environment. But the energy companies are not just behind our addiction to fossil fuels, they are just as keen to discredit alternatives to fossil fuels, and the very idea of climate change itself. In the UK, Nigel Lawson, the former Chancellor of the Exchequer, is the front man for something called the Global Warming Policy Foundation, an energy company funded organisation which is dedicated to casting doubt on man made climate change, activities which were exposed in this article in the Independent. Lawson often speaks out about climate change and was apparently responsible for changing the policy of the Daily Mail against climate change.

On my desk I have a copy of a book called 'Natural Capitalism', which was published in 1996. In this book the authors, Paul Hawken, Amory Lovins and L Hunter Lovins, show how, using resource efficiency, we can create more goods using less materials, and much less energy, and recycle the outputs on closed loops that mimic how nature works. The authors have provided us with a solution to climate change and resource depletion. Any company which uses these methods is bound to be much more efficient and competitive than its rivals. But this hasn't happened, certainly not on any kind of scale that will help the planet. The reason why is that capitalism, far from being dynamic and innovative, is inherently conservative. People stick with what they know works, and what they know is profitable, and they also often have large amounts of capital tied up in plant and machinery which is simply out-of-date. I've posted about this problem before here.

Natural Capitalism in action

So what is the answer? Its simple. Governments bailed out the banks. Now they must make changes happen to prevent climate change. The move to renewables  must go ahead and the energy companies must be made to make that change. If they won't do it they must be nationalised. The solar energy Feed in Tariff (FIT) must be maintained at a reasonable level instead of being cut in half as this government is doing. We also have to make companies use resource efficient methods, both through incentives and regulation. We need a Green New Deal to insulate all our homes and create thousands of jobs. The market has failed us, and will continue to fail us. Its time that democratically elected governments  remembered what they are their for - to represent the interests of the people and the common good - not to bow down to the market.