Comhar SDC Chairman’s Blog

Commentary by Professor Frank J. Convery, Chairperson of Comhar Sustainable Development Council and Heritage Trust Professor of Environmental Policy UCD

Summary

The European Union has created a market for carbon dioxide (CO₂), the main greenhouse gas.  This has already achieved abatement in CO₂ emission and has created the impetus for innovation that is essential if we are to meet the climate change challenge at costs that are acceptable.

The European Union’s progress has been achieved with no discernible negative impacts on overall or sectoral economic performance, the latter facilitated by the fact that allowances were allocated for free.  And the European Commission has announced ambitious proposals to tighten the cap on total emissions over the 2013 to 2020 period, to auction allowances and to centralise management of the scheme. 

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Commentary by Professor Frank J. Convery, Chairperson of Comhar Sustainable Development Council and Heritage Trust Professor of Environmental Policy UCD

Executive Summary

Informing ourselves about nuclear power for electricity generation will demand time and effort. At the very least, it will involve clarifying what is likely to happen if we don’t adopt nuclear power; estimating the costs and scale of a prospective plant or set of plants and whether any state subsidy is required; identifying the emissions of CO2 (greenhouse gas) with and without nuclear power, and the associated financial implications; focusing on the risks, how they will be insured, and by whom; examining security of supply for nuclear fuel and the alternatives; analysing the issues relating to nuclear weapons’ proliferation; addressing how terrorism threats would be countered and the risks, if any, of radiation release; analysing options for waste disposal, their costs, who carries them and how. 

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Commentary by Professor Frank J. Convery, Chairperson of Comhar Sustainable Development Council and Heritage Trust Professor of Environmental Policy UCD

The recent meeting in Bali of the parties to the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) agreed to launch a process with the objective of achieving an agreement in Copenhagen in December 2009 that will show how the planetary community will address climate change mitigation and adaptation beyond 2012.  The key features of the agreement reached in Bali last weekend are shown in Box 1.

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Commentary by Professor Frank J. Convery, Chairperson of Comhar Sustainable Development Council , Ireland

In these days of globalisation and exposure to the vagaries of world events, it could be concluded that the performance of a small open economy is mainly a product of external forces; there is little we can do to influence our fate.  And when the Minister for Finance presents his budget every December, the commentariat often opines that it’s a meaningless exercise, all theatre and no substance.

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Commentary by Professor Frank J. Convery, Chairperson of Comhar Sustainable Development Council , Ireland

The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) is the panel of international experts that advises the UN and all of us about the science of climate change, and what can be done about it.  The Panel has issued a series of reports and, last week, issued another report that pulls together the various strands of their findings¹.

The essential message of the latest IPCC report is that, in all likelihood, we have a human-induced problem of climate change.  This could worsen quite suddenly and is likely to pose huge challenges in terms of increased risk of intense weather events and associated damage to infrastructure, property, business and homes associated with increased flooding, compounded in low-lying coastal areas by rising sea levels.  There will also be positive crop productivity and some health benefits but, overall, the risks are high that hundreds of millions will suffer unless we reduce our release of greenhouse gases – mainly carbon dioxide (CO₂) – to the atmosphere and work on adapting to change. 

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Commentary by Professor Frank J. Convery, Chairperson of Comhar Sustainable Development Council , Ireland

Ireland’s government recently agreed ambitious targets, including the reduction of greenhouse gas emissions by 3% per year over the next five years, and the introduction of a carbon levy.

Under the leadership of Dr. Lisa Ryan, Director of Research at Comhar Sustainable Development Council, we have recently made proposals to government regarding budgets over the 2008-2012 period (see Comhar Sustainable Development Council Recommendations to Government for Budgets 08-12) which are designed to meet the Government’s own objectives in manners that are fair, that will support innovation and that will not damage competitiveness.

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Frank J. Convery, Heritage Trust Professor of Environmental Policy, and chair of Comhar Sustainable Development Council

Last week, I had the privilege of meeting with delegates at a conference superbly organised by the Wicklow Uplands Council and the Irish Uplands Forum on the topic ‘Local Involvement in Countryside Management – What is Working?’ It was a good opportunity to stand back and look critically at what we have learnt from experience.

This goes against human nature: we mostly wander through life repeating the same mistakes, bumping into low ceilings and making a point of not learning to duck. As Robert Frost puts it: How many things have to happen to you before something occurs to you? So, well done to the Wicklow Uplands Council and the Irish Uplands Forum for addressing the positive, in a world where we so often focus on what doesn’t work; like what’s wrong with the Health Service or what’s wrong with the Irish rugby and soccer teams.

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Commentary by Professor Frank J. Convery, Chairperson of Comhar Sustainable Development Council , Ireland

Introduction

An exciting and effective policy instrument has been developed and implemented in the European Union which will play a key role in meeting the challenge of climate change, both within the EU and globally.  It is the European Union Emissions Trading Scheme, the EU ETS.

This is an important policy instrument for Ireland because, via trading, the EU ETS provides maximum flexibility for electricity generators, combustion plants and heavy industry in making their contribution to the reduction in greenhouse gas emissions.  The alternative would be to force every installation to reduce individually, and this would be financially expensive and less environmentally effective. 

Electricity consumers are likely to see prices they pay reflecting the value of the ‘embedded’ CO₂ emitted to produce their electricity.  The environmental effectiveness of the trading scheme would be enhanced if some of these extra costs were returned to consumers in ways that made it easy for them to further reduce emissions, for example by providing some combination of time-of-day meters, low-energy light bulbs, insulation, etc.  This would also be fair.

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Commentary by Professor Frank J. Convery, Chairperson of Comhar Sustainable Development Council , Ireland

Introduction

Universities are engines of innovation.  And yet they often play little role in energising their own adjacent communities.  Collaboration with local authorities rarely goes beyond rhetoric.  This results in losses to universities, who could benefit from the sense of place and the reality checks that localism brings.  Simultaneously, communities lose the innovation that could sustain their economies and societies.

In this commentary, I want to focus on the general issue of collaboration between local authorities and universities.  I use my own local situation – University College Dublin (UCD) and Dun Laoghaire Rathdown (DLR) County Council – as a case study demonstrating the challenges and how to move forward, using the sustainability agenda as a means of encouraging collaboration ¹.  Of course, the facts vary with the setting, and what applies here will not be germane everywhere, but there are some general lessons we can draw from the experiences of UCD and DLR.

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Commentary by Professor Frank J. Convery, Chairperson of Comhar Sustainable Development Council , Ireland

The new Irish Government has set ambitious targets for greenhouse gas reduction. 

In its Agreed Programme for Government 2007-2012, the Government has agreed to ‘set a target for this administration of a reduction of 3% per year on average in our greenhouse gas emissions’.

A reduction of 3% per annum compound over five years means achieving 86.26% of 2007 emissions in 2012.

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