Priests protest over climate

Longannet: coal power station

Catholic bishops and environmentalists converge on Poznan climate talks

 

By Bruce Whitehead

A LEADING SCOTTISH development charity will join the biggest-ever coalition of Catholic aid agencies this week in Poland to demand climate justice for developing countries. SCIAF, the Scottish Catholic International Aid Fund, along with over 170 other Catholic aid groups will lobby ministers at the UN climate change talks in Poznan, as they work on a replacement for the Kyoto accord which expires in 2012.

SCIAF’s Campaigns Officer Lexi Barnett said that while wealthy countries consumed vast amounts of energy, it was people in developing countries who were suffering the consequences.  “Changing rainfall patterns, storms and droughts are drastically increasing the challenges faced by people already struggling to escape extreme poverty,” she added. Ms Barnett quoted  studies by the World Health Organisation showing that 150,000 people die every year from the effects of climate change, and said ministers – including the environment minister Ed Miliband – meeting in Poznan had a moral obligation to assist developing countries.

            Yesterday thousands marched in London and Glasgow to mark the UN talks. WWF, TearFund  and Friends of the Earth held a rally at Glasgow Caledonian University, while in London the former environment minister Michael Meacher addressed hundreds of church-goers, cyclists and campaigners on need for action. But following recent successes in persuading Westminster and Holyrood to adopt emissions limits for shipping and aviation, environmentalists are shifting their sights towards other targets. As the UK and Scottish governments signal moves towards new fossil-fuelled power stations, campaigners are focusing their resistance on the rebirth of King Coal.

            Dave O’Carroll is a member of the recently-formed Scotland Against New Coal. He says it’s a myth that coal can be burned cleanly: “Even power station managers admit that their scheme for Longannet, which generates a quarter of Scotland’s energy, can only clean about 20 percent of emissions. That means 80 percent is still filthy.” He says schemes for capturing and storing CO2 emissions are dubious, and involve unproven technology. “Saying a power plant is ‘carbon capture ready’ simply means they’ve put aside a car-park on the offchance that it will one day house a treatment plant,” he added. “It’s like announcing a new transport policy in the hope that teleportation will eventually be invented.”

            Other campaigners insist that the new coal plants should only be built if they can be fitted with carbon capture and storage from the outset. Duncan McLaren of Friends of the Earth Scotland says there needs to be a limit on the trading of CO2 allowances in order to ensure that Scotland delivers emissions cuts and thus benefits from green technology and jobs. He added: “That means introducing tough emissions standards for new power stations, which would stop so-called “carbon-ready” proposals such as Hunterston, and ensure that carbon capture and storage would be put in from the outset.”

            However, the power generating companies insist they are following the UK government’s line on carbon capture in order to win funding to develop effective technology. A government competition worth up to half a billion pounds is being held to develop the best way to capture and store CO2 emissions, with the winner due to be announced next summer. Already one of the four contenders, BP, has given up leaving only Scottish Power, Peel Energy and Eon in the running. To enter the competition, Scottish Power is designing a 300MW plant to handle around a fifth of Longannet’s carbon dioxide output. The plan is to store the black liquid residue under the North Sea in depleted gas fields.

            A spokesman for Scottish Power said while it was true that improved energy efficiency and renewables could reduce the need for extra generating capacity, ageing power stations meant that new coal-fired plants were essential as part of the energy mix. He said the advantage of the £170m scheme at Longannet, near Kincardine was that it would be retro-fitted to the power station in time to meet the government’s competition target of 2014. The plant is otherwise scheduled to close in 2020.