- The state can have a role in environmental policy. However it should concentrate on areas already within in it's remits, such as environmental policies within the public services.
- Around 60% of all energy is lost from power station to consumer. There should be a national strategy to encourage Council's to go down the route of self-sufficiency.
- Councils should be encouraged to take themselves off the grid through energy decentralisation.
- Investment should be made into implementing locally based energy generation with a combination of solar, cogeneration, trigeneration, wind, fuel cells and tidal power (where appropriate).
- All local authority property, including social housing should have its energy supplied by these decentralised power sources.
- This will create localised grid that will rely on the national grid only for power resiliency.
- Woking Borough Council provides the case study for how such a strategy is possible.
- All new social housing building projects should have local decentralised power generation within in their design plans.
- The benefits of the above are not just environmental. They will tackle the scandalous waste of energy that currently takes place.
- If we stop wasting 60% of energy in the delivery, then we can consume the same amount but actually produce less. Such an approach would have order of magnitude impact on our CO2 emission output far greater than blunt tax increases.
- As has been found in Woking, such strategies provide the means to sell excess energy back to the grid, and also means that local energy prices in council property can be kept stable and relatively low.
- A range of tax breaks should be introduced to encourage, rather than coerce, changes in individual behaviour, thus acknowledging that not everyone will change their ways and that is there choice as individuals at liberty in civil society.
- For example, increases in vehicle excise duty will hit the poorest and push them off the road entirely as they will not be able to afford to buy a brand new low emission car. Instead, rebates should be offered on vehicle excise duty on the basis of how much mileage a car does in a given year. This genuinely provides an incentive to changes in behaviour.
- Local offsetting initiatives in conjunction with organisations like Climate Care.
Monday, October 30, 2006
Dizzy's Environmental Proposals
The Environmental policy debate appears to be moving a pace with ernest today. Below are some alternatives to Miliband's insanity.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
6 comments:
I agree entirely with your line of reasoning. The government should look at it's on ways of reducing it's impact upon the climate. Rather than attempting to force individuals into costly and life changing decisions.
Unfortunately by privatising the ultilities and the rail system. It has allowed an area where it could have had a greater impact outside of it's control.
Although short term shareholder's greed might be an arguement for re-nationalizing these.
Cynic that I am, I see these proposed increases in taxation as Gordimmo trying to cover up the shortfalls of his past policies. Which are liable to come to haunt him should he remove Blair.
Again you start from the assumption that we can have an effect on climate change and to do so is a good idea.
Again I do not. I start from the assumption that we're wasting shedload of energy and if we didn't do so it would be an infitely GOOD thing. I also start from the assumption that anything we dom should be revenue neutral thus it doesn't matter who is bloody right. At the end fo the day its about being pragamatic. Do I buy the doom and gloom perception that predicst gloabl chaso, no. Do I beleive that we have an impact on the environment around us with our action? Of course we do, the extent of that impact is certainly in question, but denying it utterly is to deny empirical cause and effect (and this respect I am not simply talking about carbon, I'm talking about pollution etc etc).
I really don;t udnerstand what you're objectino is to revenue neutral proposal and proposals to make our energy more efficient than the current status quo which sees us waste 60% of it from pwoer station to consumer.
Actually it was the fact that the system was nationalised that led to such a wasteful system. Its typically socialist to build huge factories and then spend a fortune getting the product to the consumer.
Localised production means the possibility of combined heat and power as well as much less transmission losses.
Why not just limit the amount of plane journeys per year that can fly in British airspace?
You then auction those journeys off to plane companies and to stop companies getting a monopoly you limit them to 30% of all journeys.
I predict the treasury would make 100s of millions and the increased cost would be passed onto the customer which may make people not want to fly especially if you also take VAT off ferry, boat and channel tunnel tickets
I would add that sensible incentives to business, through tax credits for them for developing/selling lower emissions cars etc should be a winner.
Create a market with sound and minimal regulation and we will improve the environment. Less pollution is a clear public good. The nonsense of Milliband et al is just fig-leaf covering for their financial profligacy
Post a Comment