#GE2017 Green Party

This is a rather late and a shorter version. But the Green Party made it easy to pick out their environmental pledges. They are the only party with a separate environment manifesto – perhaps not surprisingly. It can be seen here.

Green Party’s key environmental policies are on this webpage, easy to see:

• An Environmental Protection Act to safeguard and restore our environment, protect and enhance biodiversity, promote sustainable food and farming, and ensure animal protection.
• A public works programme of insulation to make every home warm and investing in flood defences and natural flood management to make every community safer.
• Equality of access to nature and green spaces, to enhance leisure, health and wellbeing.
• Active ongoing cooperation with businesses and other countries to limit global temperature increases to well below 2 degrees and aiming for 1.5 degrees.
• Replacing fracking, coal power stations, subsidies to fossil fuels and nuclear with the clean green efficient renewable energy of the future, and investing in community owned energy.

• Introduce a one-off fine on car manufacturers who cheated the emissions testing regime and create a new Clean Air Act, expanding and funding a mandatory clean air zone network.
• Strong protection for the Green Belt, National Parks, SSSIs and Areas of Outstanding Natural Beauty.
• A wider, more effective network of marine protected areas around our coasts, including fully protected no take zones.
• Tough action to reduce plastic and other waste, including the introduction of Deposit Return Schemes, with a zero waste target.

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#GE2017 Liberal Democrats

LibDem Manifesto – Environmental Coverage

LibDems have the longest section on the environment. You can click on the title above to go to the page where you can see the Manifesto. There are no costings that accompany this manifesto. The summary below shows quotations from the manifesto (in italics with page numbers reported) and some commentary.  The titles are mostly as they appear in the manifesto, unless statements are grouped.

Brexit and Environment

“Maintaining environmental standards: The European Union has created the highest environmental standards in the world. We have a duty to future generations to protect our environment and tackle climate change. Liberal Democrats will ensure that everything is done to maintain those high standards in UK law, including the closest possible co-operation on climate and energy policy.” P.11

 Investment

“We will ensure that the National Infrastructure Commission takes fully into account the environmental implications of all national infrastructure decisions.” P.37

“Traditional indicators of economic activity such as GDP are poor guides to genuine prosperity and wellbeing. We will therefore introduce a National Wellbeing Strategy covering all aspects of government policy, including health, housing and the environment.” P.39

Devolved Administrations

• “Provide assistance to areas heavily dependent on fossil fuel industries, such as the north-east of Scotland, to diversify away from these industries.
• Give the immediate go-ahead to the Swansea Bay tidal lagoon project.” P.44

Keeping Our Country Green

This is the main environment chapter of the manifesto. The priorities are:

• “Ensuring that four million properties receive insulation retrofits by 2022, prioritising fuel-poor households.
• Preventing 40,000 deaths a year with our Air Quality Plan to reduce air pollution.
• Ensuring British farming remains competitive and doesn’t lose out – refocusing support towards producing healthy food and public benefits.” 47

This Section is too long to reproduce here (pages 47 – 54). But as a summary:

Five new green laws are proposed: a Green Transport Act, a Zero-Carbon Britain Act, a Nature Act, a Green Buildings Act, and a Zero-Waste Act to “incorporate existing EU environmental protections, maintain product standards such as for energy efficiency, and establish a framework for continual improvement”. P.47

The Liberal Democrats pledge to pass a Zero-Carbon Britain Act to set new legally binding targets to reduce net greenhouse gas emissions by 80% by 2040 and to zero by 2050.

Energy

The manifesto includes the aim to generate 60% of electricity from renewables by 2030, restore government support for solar PV and onshore wind in appropriate locations and build more interconnectors to underpin this higher reliance on renewables.

Saving energy will be a top infrastructure priority and a new Green Buildings Act will be passed to set new energy efficiency targets, including a long-term ambition for every home in England to reach at least an energy rating of Band C by 2035. The comment I made about overheating when reviewing the Labour manifesto about insulating houses applies here too.

Close to our work the chapter also mentions the Natural Capital Committee (the only manifesto to do so, so far, though of course outcomes are more important than processes). The Liberal Democrats will pass a Nature Act to “put the Natural Capital Committee (NCC) on a statutory footing, set legally binding natural capital targets, including on biodiversity, clean air and water, and empower the NCC to recommend actions to meet these targets”. P.50

International Development

“Provide greater resources for international environmental co-operation, particularly on climate change and on actions to tackle illegal and unsustainable trade in timber, wildlife, ivory and fish.” P.85

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#GE2017 Labour Party

Labour Manifesto – environmental coverage

‘Environment’ appears as a sub-title in the ‘Leading Richer Lives’ section. While I like the acknowledgement of the contribution of the environment to ‘richer’ lives, I was initially concerned that they allocated only one page to the topic out of 123. But reading through the whole text reveals environmental issues have been woven into almost all the Chapters.

You can click on the title above to go to the page where you can see both the Manifesto. The costings that accompany this manifesto can also be found in the same link. The summary below shows quotations from the manifesto (in italics with page numbers reported) and some commentary.  The titles are mostly as they appear in the manifesto, unless statements are grouped.

Industrial Strategy

“National and local government spends £200 billion a year in the private-sector procurement. Labour will put that spending power to good use to upgrade our economy, create good local jobs and reduce inequality. We will require firms supplying national or local government to meet the high standards we should expect of all businesses: paying their taxes, recognising trade unions, respecting workers’ rights and equal opportunities, protecting the environment, providing training, and paying suppliers on time.” P. 14

Environmental Policy and Brexit

“We will drop the Conservatives’ Great Repeal Bill, replacing it with an EU Rights and Protections Bill that will ensure there is no detrimental change to workers’ rights, equality law, consumer rights or environmental protections as a result of Brexit.

Throughout the Brexit process, we will make sure that all EU-derived laws that are of benefit 􀈂 including workplace laws, consumer rights and environmental protections – are fully protected without qualifications, limitations or sunset clauses.” p.25

“A Labour approach to Brexit will ensure there can be no rolling back of key rights and protections and that the UK does not lag behind Europe in workplace protections and environmental standards in future.” p.26

Energy

“We will transform our energy systems, investing in new, state-of-the-art low-carbon gas and renewable electricity production” p.12

“…ensure that 60% of the UK’s energy comes from zero-carbon or renewable sources by 2030” p.14

“…to ensure we meet our climate change targets and transition to a low-carbon economy” p.20

“For renters, Labour will improve on existing Landlord Energy Efficiency regulations and re-establish the Landlord Energy Saving Allowance to encourage the uptake of efficiency measures.” p.21

“Labour will ban fracking because it would lock us into an energy infrastructure based on fossil fuels, long after the point in 2030 when the Committee of Climate Change says gas in the UK must sharply decline.” p.21

Climate Change – mitigation and adaptation

“Labour will insulate four million homes as an infrastructure priority to help those who suffer cold homes each winter.” p.20. This insulation design and materials should also take account of homes overheating due to increasing severity and frequency of extreme weather (like heat waves) due to climate change (see Climate Change Risk Assessment).

“We will insulate more homes to help people manage the cost of energy bills, to reduce preventable winter deaths, and to meet our climate change targets.” P.60

“We will reclaim Britain’s leading role in tackling climate change, working hard to preserve the Paris Agreement and deliver on international commitments to reduce emissions while mitigating the impacts of climate change on developing countries.” P.118

Transport

“We will retrofit thousands of diesel busses in areas with the most severe air quality problems to Euro 6 standards.” P.91

“We welcome the work done by the Airports Commission, and we will guarantee that any airport expansion adheres to our tests that require noise issues to be addressed, air quality to be protected, the UK’s climate change obligations met and growth across the country supported.” P. 92

 Water

“Replace our dysfunctional water system with a network of regional publicly-owned water companies.” p.19. Commenting on the merits of this, or supporting this proposal (or not) is not my intention, neither am I able to do this. Serious work needs to be undertaken on defining dysfunctional, assessing the feasibility of this proposal and drawing regional boundaries. If the regions were defined according to catchment (or several catchments) boundaries, then they would be in line with the ‘catchment management / partnership’ approach that has been gaining traction.

Land Use

“We will prioritise brownfield sites and protect the green belt.” p.60

Environment Sub-Section – key actions (p 93-94)

Investing in our environment is investing in our future. We will defend and extend existing environmental protections. We will champion sustainable farming, food and fishing by investing in and promoting skills, technology, market access and innovation.

• prioritise a sustainable, long-term future for our farming, fishing and food industries, fund robust flood resilience, invest in rural and coastal communities, and guarantee the protection and advancement of environmental quality standards.
• Labour will introduce a new Clean Air Act to deal with the Conservative legacy of illegal air quality.
• We will safeguard habitats and species in the ‘blue belts’ of the seas and oceans surrounding our island.
• We will set guiding targets for plastic bottle deposit schemes, working with food manufacturers and retailers to reduce waste.
• We will protect our bees by prohibiting neonicotinoids as soon as our EU relationship allows us to do so.
• We will work with farmers and foresters to plant a million trees of native species to promote biodiversity and better flood management.
• Labour will keep them in public hands.
• Our stewardship of the environment needs to be founded on sound principles and based on scientific assessments. We will establish a science innovation fund, working with farmers and fisheries that will include support for our small scale fishing fleet.

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#GE2017 Conservative Party

 

Conservative Manifesto – environmental coverage 

The environment is not mentioned in the table of contents neither in the five giant challenges. If you counted the number of times the word ‘environment’ is repeated in the text, your hopes may be raised. But the word is more often used in a different context like ‘business environment’, ‘regulatory environment’ and so on.

The previous manifesto’s pledge is repeated albeit in slightly different words: I believe the previous one referred to ‘the greenest government’.  Also previously the logo was a green tree.

“Finally, we pledge to be the first generation to leave the environment in a better state than we inherited it. That is why we shall produce a comprehensive 25 Year Environment Plan that will chart how we will improve our environment as we leave the European Union and take control of our environmental legislation again.” p.26

The 25 Year Environment Plan has been in preparation for about two years (with the initially high expectations of content recently reduced to an outline).

You can click on the title above to go to the page where you can see the Manifesto. There are no costings that accompany this manifesto. The summary below shows quotations from the manifesto (in italics with page numbers reported) and some commentary.  The titles are mostly as they appear in the manifesto, unless statements are grouped.

Industrial Strategy

“We will ensure industry and businesses have access to reliable, cheap and clean power.” p.19. It would have been good to see a reference to ensuring best practice environmental management, even if not minimising environmental impacts, mentioned in the Industrial Strategy where this quote is taken from.

“We will therefore commission an independent review into the Cost of Energy, which will be asked to make recommendations as to how we can ensure UK energy costs are as low as possible, while ensuring a reliable supply and allowing us to meet our 2050 carbon reduction objective.

And because for British companies, an energy-efficient business is a more competitive business, we will establish an industrial energy efficiency scheme to help large companies install measures to cut their energy use and their bills.

For instance, while we do not believe that more large-scale onshore wind power is right for England, we will maintain our position as a global leader in offshore wind and support the development of wind projects in the remote islands of Scotland, where they will directly benefit local communities. ” p.22

“We will therefore develop the shale industry in Britain. We will only be able to do so if we maintain public confidence in the process, if we uphold our rigorous environmental protections, and if we ensure the proceeds of the wealth generated by shale energy are shared with the communities affected.” This and more detail on how this ambition will be met can be found on page 23.

Transport

“We want almost every car and van to be zero-emission by 2050 – and will invest £600 million by 2020 to help achieve it. We will invest in more low-emission buses, as well as supporting audio-visual displays for bus passengers and community minibuses for rural areas poorly served by public transport.” p.24

Towns and Cities

“Our towns and cities should be healthy, well-designed and well-tended places. We will take action against poor air quality in urban areas. In addition to the 11 million trees we are planting across our nation, we will ensure that 1 million more are planted in our towns and cities, and place new duties on councils to consult when they wish to cut down street trees. We will encourage the very best practice in the design of buildings and public spaces, including a review of the design of government buildings, to ensure that when the state builds, it makes a positive contribution to a local area. We will do more to reduce litter, including by supporting comprehensive rubbish collection and recycling, supporting better packaging, taking new powers to force councils to remove roadside litter and prosecuting offenders. We will do more to improve the quality of road surfaces, filling potholes – especially in residential areas – and reducing road noise.” p.25

The Environment and Brexit

“We have huge ambitions for our farming industry: we are determined to grow more, sell more and export more great British food. We want to provide stability to farmers as we leave the EU and set up new frameworks for supporting food production and stewardship of the countryside. So we will continue to commit the same cash total in funds for farm support until the end of the parliament. We will work with farmers, food producers and environmental experts across Britain and with the devolved administrations to devise a new agri-environment system, to be introduced in the following parliament.

 

We will help Natural England to expand their provision of technical expertise to farmers to deliver environmental improvements on a landscape scale, from enriching soil fertility to planting hedgerows and building dry stone walls. We will deliver on our commitment to improve natural flood management, such as improving the quality of water courses to protect against soil erosion and damage to vulnerable habitats and communities. We will continue to ensure that public forests and woodland are kept in trust for the nation, and provide stronger protections for our ancient woodland.” p.26

“When we leave the European Union and its Common Fisheries Policy, we will be fully responsible for the access and management of the waters where we have historically exercised sovereign control. A new Conservative government will work with the fishing industry and with our world-class marine scientists, as well as the devolved administrations, to introduce a new regime for commercial fishing that will preserve and increase fish stocks and help to ensure prosperity for a new generation of fishermen. To provide complete legal certainty to our neighbours and clarity during our negotiations with the European Union, we will withdraw from the London Fisheries Convention. We will continue our work to conserve the marine environment off the coast of the United Kingdom.” p. 27

Protecting the global environment

“We will continue to lead international action against climate change, and the degradation of habitat and loss of species.” p.38

“The United Kingdom will lead the world in environmental protection. As Conservatives, we are committed to leaving the environment in better condition than we inherited it. That is why we will continue to take a lead in global action against climate change, as the government demonstrated by ratifying the Paris Agreement. We were the first country to introduce a Climate Change Act, which Conservatives helped to frame, and we are halfway towards meeting our 2050 goal of reducing emissions by eighty per cent from 1990 levels.

We will champion greater conservation co-operation within international bodies, protecting rare species, the polar regions and international waters. We will work with our Overseas Territory governments to create a Blue Belt of marine protection in their precious waters, establishing the largest marine sanctuaries anywhere in the world.” p.40

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UK General Election 2017 – environmental manifestos

 

Call me a silly cow but I’m excited about this election because I don’t think it’s only about Brexit!

I think it’s about making a decision on what role we want for the public sector and policy in all areas of government. It’s about the vision for the kind of country we want to live in. A good Brexit deal will then be one which helps us the most in making that vision reality.

It is also for this reason that I’ve read the main parties’ manifestos and will be writing a series on their coverage of environmental issues and policies.

I did this back in 2005. It was the first election I could vote in, in these pastures.

In 2010, I only searched for some key words through the texts.

This year….did I say I am excited about this election?!

So, every day this week you will get a review of the environmental pledges of a political party.  I’ll add the links here as they come online.

Conservative Party manifesto 2017 – environment overview

Labour Party manifesto 2017 – environment overview

Liberal Democrat manifesto 2017 – environment overview

UKIP manifesto 2017 – environment overview

Green Party manifesto 2017 – environment overview

For a final word from me on the manifestos click here

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Letter to the Media – the draft Habitat and Biodiversity Bill in Turkey is a catastrophe

Sir,

As the streets of Turkish cities host horrific scenes of police brutality against unarmed civilians, in the wake of peaceful protests against destruction of one of the last green areas in central Istanbul, the Turkish Parliament is preparing to rush through a vote on a policy that will allow much more widespread destruction of nature.

The Habitats and Biodiversity Bill is based on the European Union Habitats and Wild Birds Directives, but with two vital differences.

In EU member states the criterion of ‘over-riding public interest’ for allowing developments in conservation areas is applied through long-established systems of Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA), stakeholder engagement and public consultation.  But the definition of ‘overriding public interest’ is vague in the Turkish bill, there is no system of consultation in the country, and EIAs, if they are carried out at all, are often conducted long after a development project starts.

Secondly, for protected land, the EU also requires that there be ‘No Alternatives’ for siting the development.  The draft bill in the Turkish Parliament, by contrast, will simply abolish the National Parks law. The draft bill has been opposed to by 113 NGOs, and the European Commission itself described the draft bill as “worrying” (Turkey Progress Report, 9 November 2010), but the criticisms have been ignored.

This highly controversial legislation is being rushed through the Turkish Parliament, under cover of civil unrest, and represents a catastrophe for nature conservation in Turkey.  As natural and social scientists leading European research in biodiversity conservation and the human benefits derived from natural systems, we support our Turkish academic and NGO colleagues in deploring this myopic legislation and calling on the Turkish government to redraft this legislation taking account of their legitimate concerns.

Signed: coordinators and researchers at the following European Commission funded biodiversity related research projects.

Ms Ece Ozdemiroglu, Managing Director, economics for the environment consultancy,http://www.eftec.co.uk, United Kingdom

Dr Robert Tinch, Brussels Representative, eftec and OPERAs project, Belgium

Prof Dr Wouter de Groot, BIOMOT project, the Netherlands

Dr Rob Bugter, BESAFE Project, the Netherlands

Prof Dr Josef Settele, SCALES, Germany

Dr Sybille van den Hove, SPRIAL project, Spain

Dr Rupert Read, University of East Anglia, United Kingdom

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Colombiodivesita 2: Nearly a Payment for Ecosystem Services System

We have organisations working hard to implement payments for ecosystem services (PES) approaches in the UK, often in water management. As novel approaches they often face implementation challenges. Payments for ecosystem services are eminently suited to the case of water supply management in Colombia: 70% of the population’s water supply originates from upland areas, such as the area known as the Chingaza from which most of Bogota’s water flows. These areas are also home to significant biodiversity, including species endemic to the Central Andean highlands (including the spectacled bear).

The policy framework is supportive of the principle of PES: local government authorities are obliged to spend a percentage of their revenues from water fees on water source management. However, these have to be spent within the regional environmental authority boundaries, which are aligned along sub-catchment boundaries. Given that the most populous areas are rarely in the upland areas with the highest rainfall, so little of this money finds its way to these highland habitats.

In fact a PES arrangement has been organised outside this formal water source management structure, with the City of Bogota water authority supporting the management of Chingaza, from which the majority of its water supply flows. So there is nearly a fantastic PES setup, but the laws restricting the expenditure of water fees to local areas clearly weren’t drafted by a hydrologist.

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Energy and Forestry in the UK

Spoke to the Institute of Chartered Foresters annual conference in London this week, an event where people think very hard about trees. The UK is a pretty small island in forestry terms. One Canadian Speaker said “stick to gardening” (he was joking a bit) and I got an insight into the realities of biomass-fuel.

As well as being one of the UK’s biggest CO₂ polluters, Drax power station is also our biggest renewable energy source, as it now mixes dried biomass pellets into the coal it burns. This relies on large-scale imports of biomass (UK timber resources are too small and thinly spread), which mirrors the plant reliance on large-scale imports of coal (after extraction, similar supply chain logistics are involved).

That’s not to say we should give up on the UK’s woodfuel, but it needs to supply smaller local markets. Community buildings, communities and homes are all looking to burn more wood. The UK has under-managed small woodlands that could supply this resource, giving energy and ecological benefits.

Furthermore, our future energy deficit is going to be big enough that we’ll need both sources of biomass energy: large-scale importers like Drax, and utilisation of our domestic resources in smaller-scale generation. And more energy efficiency too.

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Tar sands

We’ve written about tar sands before (see this post from June 2010) but as there is very little time before the discussions on the EU Directive on Fuel Quality come to an end and there is press coverage on the issue, we thought we should write about it again.

Along with Desmond Tutu and others whose views are covered in The Guardian last week and many others on this online petition, we as environmental economists, believe that tar sands ain’t worth it!

Why?

By the time we put it in our cars or use it for any other purpose, we think fuel is fuel. Yes, we know about the types differentiated mostly by the efficiency with which they burn and whether they are leaded or unleaded but ultimately, most of us do not care about where the petrol comes from. Because, unlike the labels on, say food, we are not given this information at the point of purchase.

But it does matter where the oil comes from and how it is processed before it ends up in the pump.

Extracting oil from tar sands is more energy intensive and more polluting than extracting oil from other sources

and

Because of where it is, extracting tar sands oil also means that boreal forests and vast areas of land are being destroyed….it’s not like drilling a small hole and waiting for the petrol to gush out a la “There will be Blood”(not implying that that method is harmless).

Not everyone cares of course. But we know from studies we’ve conducted that the more information consumers have, the more of them choose the option with less environmental impact.

And more information is part of consumer sovereignty that should surely be a priority for a Conservative and Liberal Government.

Blocking the EU Directive on Fuel Quality is not about freedom of choice but NOT blocking it is.

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Viva La Mexico!

Today is the 200^th anniversary of Mexico’s independence. I spent 2 weeks there recently, partly for work and partly for holiday. It was the low season on the Caribbean coast which meant very quiet beaches there and lots of (mostly warm) rain wherever in the country I went. But this is not a blog for holidays…

Work there was very interesting too. I spoke at a workshop on economic valuation organised by the National Institute of Ecology (Instituto Nacional Ecologica). The workshop was attended by a large group of well informed and highly enthusiastic people from the public sector, NGOs and academia. Some research funders were also there.

Mexico is a bit of a paradise for an environmental economist – and I repeat not just because of the tourist attractions, even though they include the Museum of Economics in Mexico City! Rather it is because they have used the methodologies and instruments of the profession rather more extensively than one might expect. For example

• The Mexican system of Payments for Hydrological Environmental Services (PSAH), which is one of the first Payments of Ecosystem Services. Mexico faces both high deforestation rates and severe water scarcity problems. The PSAH was designed by the federal government to pay participating forest owners for the benefits of watershed protection and aquifer recharge in those areas where commercial forestry is not currently competitive. It seeks to complement an array of forest policies that include development of community forestry firms and prohibitions of land use changes. Funding comes from a fee charged to federal water users. Applicants are selected according to several criteria that include indicators of the value of water scarcity in the region. For a paper that describes the process of policy design, main actors and rules, and provides a preliminary evaluation please click here.
• The fisheries buyback scheme (buying back excess fishing gear) to protect endangered marine mammals, and
• A pilot project to reduce energy subsidies and make sure that they are not indexed to production to protect overexploited aquifers.

Amongst the future projects, there is the possibility of a TEEB application for Mexico which came up in the discussions at the workshop but hopefully will become reality. TEEB is an international project that quantified and where possible monetised the services provided by the ecosystems and biodiversity worldwide. Country specific applications of its methods are emerging to estimate the economic value of the natural capital countries own. Benefit of such an application is that big numbers are talked about in the media and the overall process engages all sorts of different stakeholders who can see ‘what’s in it for them’ more clearly.

On a clearer link to holidaying in Mexico…I think there is a lot of room to increase the entry fees to the attractions like the Mayan ruins at Tulum (less than US$5 per person) and Sian Ka’an Biosphere Reserve (US$2.5 per person). There will of course be the predictable protests from local and international businesses but really compared to the benefits provided by such places and the funding need for their maintenance, such entry fees are terribly low. We hope our friends at INE will receive the support they deserve if and when they pursue arguments for a better benefit capture from such sites.

As you can easily find millions of attractive photos of Mexico on the internet, I thought I end with a photo much harder to find…a case of ‘appropriate technology’ in perfect use at a restaurant toilet inside the Sian Ka’an Biosphere Reserve (snorkelling at the reef there was interesting too!) .

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