The UN Climate Ambition Summit was held this week, and there were great expectations that this would be the occasion when the world’s leaders would finally understand that it was their most critical priority to address the climate crisis. Yet at the summit, UN Secretary General António Guterres could not hold back his concerns: “Humanity has opened the gates to hell,” he lamented, noting that the world was on track for a 2.8C temperature rise since pre-industrial times. China, the US, India and Japan (to mention only a few) didn’t even speak at the summit. But then it got worse. On Wednesday, UK Prime Minister Rishi Sunak announced a serious roll-back of net zero targets and timetable. Britain has taken pride in being a leader in reducing GHG emissions. Not anymore. What irony that on Friday, the Financial Times reported (behind a paywall) that improving energy efficiency top of the agenda in fight for net zero and the IEA home page warned that “in a hotter world energy efficiency is more important than ever.”
To top the week (you couldn’t make this up) on Saturday (23/9) the UK government scrapped its high level energy efficiency task force after only six months. It was tasked with overseeing initiatives to insulate homes and upgrade boilers. It was chaired by the energy efficiency minister Lord Callanan and includes many leaders in the energy efficiency world. As the Guardian writes: “. . .it appears to be a casualty of Rishi Sunak’s decision to scrap energy efficiency regulations for landlords in an overhaul of green policies.” For background on those regulations, see the post by Andrew Warren this week.)
Is there any hope of our political leaders coming to their senses at COP28 later this year? And would someone get these messages through to the British PM? What will make him see that his wrongheaded reversal of commitment to energy efficiency is not just a disheartening signal to Britain and the world, but it is not even politically astute in a country that supports action against climate change.
To ensure the zero carbon energy transition gains momentum we need a new generation of experts to continue the good work. EiD encourages all young researchers (born after 1988) in energy efficiency and biomass to submit contributions for next year’s Young Energy Researchers Conference on March 5th as part of World Sustainable Energy Days, March 5-8, 2024 in Wels, Austria. Altogether there are six conferences and a tradeshow packed into the four days. The theme of this year’s energy efficiency conference is “Energy efficiency now – fast, smart, resilient!” Submissions for the young energy researchers conference are invited from any scientific field (e.g. technology, engineering, economics, social sciences, architecture, law, arts) and must be in English only. The deadline for submissions is October 10th. Rod is a member of the scientific committee for the young researchers’ conference.
Niels Bohr (1885-1962), the Danish physicist and Nobel laureate who made foundational contributions to understanding atomic structure and quantum theory, offers his views on predictions: “Prediction is very difficult, especially if it’s about the future.”
With so many people on the move this year, here is some useful news to help you along:
- It is encouraging to see the growing demand for train travel. Euronews provides us with the best new European train routes launching in 2023 and 2024.
- If you’re interested in a cycling trip this year, have a look at the Epic Road Rides website that describes the 12 best cycling destinations in Europe this year.
- For those travelling in the US, Lonely Planet provides 9 of the most incredible train journeys in the USA.
- With growing concerns about the impact of flying, check out the new discussion note on synthetic aviation fuels and the European Parliament’s latest efforts to boost green aviation fuels.
EiD welcomes your views about this week’s selection of posts on the zero-carbon energy transition:
| · British PM and the net zero transition – lessons from history about flip-flopping on the environment |
Please send us your comments on any of the posts. EiD hopes you to follow us on X at @EnergyDemand and @rodjanssen. Please recommend EiD to your friends and colleagues.
Energy in Demand - Sustainable Energy - Rod Janssen 