Another action-packed week in the world of renewables and climate progress. With a few exceptions, there’s a definite sense of positive momentum finally kicking in.

The big guns – US Climate Bill
On Friday last week the US House Of Representatives passed the American Clean Energy and Security Act of 2009, in a nail-biting session. A tough victory for President Obama, the Bill should change the energy industry forever. It’s a big moment for the US economy and the environment – not as big as many environmentalists would have wanted but a greater step in the right direction than was even imaginable a year ago.

Here are the key points:

• An emission reduction target of 17% from 2005 levels by 2020 and 83% by 2050. A cap on big industry emissions is to be set, including the energy industry. Electricity suppliers will have to hit 12% renewables by 2020, and increase their energy efficiency by 8%.
• $1 billion a year for developing carbon capture technology
• New buildings to be 30% more efficient by 2012, and 50% more efficient by 2016.
• Agriculture subsidies for environmentally-friendly farming techniques such as tilling that keeps carbon dioxide locked in soil.

Passing the bill involved a lot of negotiation and in some places more compromise by Mr Obama than desired. Greenpeace USA went as far as calling on Congress to reject it. But in general the green community sees it as a step forward, not least because of Obama’s great persuasive skill. His diplomatic approach and huge efforts to gain public support have paid off with eight Republicans even voting for it, breaking their blanket opposition to action on climate change.

Here’s an all-American, fit for Hollywood quote from Ed Markey, one of the Bill’s authors "Scientists say global warming is a dangerous man-made problem. Today we are saying clean energy will be the American-made solution." Go team America!

The Bill must still go through the US Senate, where it is likely to find its passage even tougher. So the next step is crucial. But this first positive move shows a willingness for change from the world’s second highest polluter and most influential political power, and gives hope for the ambitious talks in Copenhagen this December.

And Obama is clearly confident – the green light has just been given for $400 million of federal funding available for carbon capture research projects. With Carbon Capture that should last, hmm, about a week!

Read more here.

Scotland does even better
Greenpeace are much more likely to applaud the efforts of the Scots this week in their own historic Climate Change Bill, which has been signed, and pledges to cut emissions 42% by 2020! This exceptional move places Scotland as leader in the developed world for commitments to climate action, and places them as the only country in the world to be taking measures scientists say are the only ways to avoid catastrophe. In other words, Scotland is the only developed country in the world taking climate change seriously.

This is a hugely positive move and should be an example to countries around the world.

More good news from the East
The sun rises and the wind blows. The Chinese government are a mixed bag when it comes to climate change, but there have been some promising moves in the right direction of late. Now this is a biggie! Yesterday they announced the construction of a gigantic 40 Gigawatt, $17.6 billion wind farm to be built outside Jiuquan city to start this month. To put this in perspective, the London Array Offshore wind farm that has caused so much controversy over here will be 1 Gigawatt. It's a monster!

The Chinese have aspirations of generating 100GW of electricity by 2020, and hope to have 20 GW of this power station, “the Three Gorges Dam on the land” (lost in translation?) to be ready by then. That’s the same as the total of worldwide wind power in 2007!

Read more here.

Anyone for £70 billion and 250,000 new jobs?
Back at home the push for the green revolution has taken a further, hopefully persuasive step. The Carbon Trust has just published a report that says the UK could generate £70 billion and 250,000 new jobs by 2050 by dominating the offshore wind and wave industries.
The catch? Only £600 million.

The Carbon Trust is a government backed group dedicated to promoting low carbon technologies. They are claiming that with £600 million investment we could become world leaders in offshore wind and gain 45% of that market, contributing 15% of our emissions targets. With wave power, we already produce a quarter of the world’s technologies and if we continue along this route we will be rewarded with £2bn annual revenue and 16,000 jobs created.

Read more here.

Yet more evidence to keep in the armoury – now lets hope the government listens to it’s own advisory board.

… And now for the bad news…

BP cuts renewable energy budget and shuts down London headquarters
Poor old BP. They only made 300 gazillion pounds profit this week, and as you can imagine, need to make some cut backs. So they are shutting down their 80 strong wind and solar team in London and slashing the renewables budget by between half and a third. As most of their finances are spent on marketing, they won’t have any left to do… anything.

Worst of all, the big wigs are trying to spin this as a positive move, with Chief Executive Tony Hayward claiming “It saves money and brings it closer to home … you could almost see it as a reinforcement [of our commitment to the business],”

Well, it’s no surprise, and we don’t need 'em!

“Drax 29” found guilty
Last year the “Kingsnorth 6”, who broke into Kingsnorth power station forcing it to halt production were let off their charges as they rightly persuaded the courtroom that their actions were necessary in the face of a changing climate. No such luck for a group who hijacked a train full of coal heading for the Drax coal power station n Yorkshire (The UK’s single largest emitter) last year. The court found them guilty of obstructing the railway and they are waiting to be sentenced on September 4th.

We wonder if the same fate awaits these brave lot from Greenpeace who managed to board and halt a whole shipment of Eon’s coal just weeks ago.

Good Energy team

Green Energy Republic

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