Most of the cost of fossil fuels is hidden because environmental harms such as pollution and global warming are kept outside ordinary economic calculation. Energy companies externalize these costs (among others) – that is, they don’t pay them. The public does.

And we do, to a remarkable extent. When we think of corporate subsidies, we naturally think of taxes not paid, real estate giveaways and other ways of taking money from the public and shoveling it into corporate coffers.

Then there are the environmental costs, something prominent if we are talking about fossil fuels. These, too, should be thought of as subsidies since these constitute costs paid by the public.

A first attempt at seriously quantifying the magnitude of the totality of subsidies given to fossil fuels leads to a conclusion that the total for 2014 was US$5.6 trillion, a total expected to be matched in 2015.

Yes, you read that correctly: 5.6 trillion dollars. As in $5.6 million million. Or, to put it another way, more than seven percent of gross world product. A lot of money.

IMF report: ‘huge benefits’ from eliminating fossil fuel subsidies

These calculations are, interestingly, the product of an International Monetary Fund working paper, ‘How Large Are Global Energy Subsidies?‘

The paper, prepared by economists David Coady, Ian Parry, Louis Sears and Baoping Shang, sought to provide a fuller accounting of the costs of the environmental damages caused by fossil fuels, and found that those costs greatly exceed direct corporate subsidies and below-cost consumer pricing. The authors foresee huge benefits should all fossil-fuel subsidies be eliminated. They write:

“Eliminating post-tax subsidies in 2015 could raise government revenue by $2.9 trillion (3.6 percent of global GDP), cut global CO₂ emissions by more than 20 percent, and cut pre-mature air pollution deaths by more than half. After allowing for the higher energy costs faced by consumers, this action would raise global economic welfare by $1.8 trillion (2.2 percent of global GDP).” [page 7]

As dramatic as the preceding paragraph is, the International Monetary Fund is not suddenly questioning capitalism. The paper carries the caveat that it is “research in progress” and does not represent the views of the IMF.

Nor does the paper devote so much as a single word questioning the economic system that has produced such astounding distortions, not to mention the hideous social effects of massive inequality and power imbalances.

Nonetheless, it does present an implicit challenge to business as usual and helps conceptualize the massive costs of profligate energy usage. The paper lays out in plain language the environmental, fiscal, economic and social consequences of energy subsidies, stating that energy subsidies [page 5]:

• Damage the environment, causing more premature deaths through local air pollution, exacerbating congestion and other adverse side effects of vehicle use, and increasing atmospheric greenhouse-gas concentrations.
• Impose large fiscal costs, which need to be financed by some combination of higher public debt, higher tax burdens and crowding out potentially productive public spending (for example, on health, education and infrastructure).
• Discourage needed investments in energy efficiency, renewables and energy infrastructure, and increase the vulnerability of countries to volatile international energy prices.
• Are a highly inefficient way to provide support to low-income households since most of the benefits from energy subsidies are typically captured by rich households.

Paying for air pollution and global warming

The biggest subsidized cost is air pollution, which the paper’s authors estimate accounts for 46% of fossil fuel subsidies. Global warming is the next biggest subsidy, at 22%, with corporate and consumer subsidies, foregone taxes and other items accounting for smaller amounts.

From this calculation, the authors argue that local benefits from ending subsidies are high enough that doing so should be done in the absence of action in other countries. They write:

“An important point, therefore, is that most (over three-fourths) of the underpricing of energy is due to domestic distortions – pre-tax subsidies and domestic externalities – rather than to global distortions (climate change). The crucial implication of this is that energy pricing reform is largely in countries’ own domestic interest and therefore is beneficial even in the absence of globally coordinated action.” [page 21]

When the costs are broken down by forms of energy, it is no surprise that coal is the most subsidized form. Coal subsidies alone total almost four percent of global GDP, according to the paper, with “no country … impos[ing] meaningful taxes on coal use from an environmental perspective.” Petroleum is also heavily subsidized.

If we could at a stroke eliminate all forms of fossil fuel subsidies, the gains would be significant. The authors believe that global revenue gains would be $2.9 trillion for 2015, a total less than the current cost of subsidies because it accounts for a reduction in energy usage from higher prices and an assumption that some tax money would be used for emission-control technologies.

The authors also calculate a $1.8 trillion net gain in social welfare, a gain that could be increased were this gain used to invest in education, health and other public benefits.

So if so much good can come from rationalizing the fossil fuel industry, why does this sound like an impossible dream? Unfortunately, in real world of capitalism, there is very little to prevent corporations from externalizing their costs.

With increased corporate globalization, capital can pick up and move at will, inducing political office holders to hand out subsidies, waive taxes and refuse to enforce safety and environmental laws. They do this because the alternative is for corporations to move elsewhere in a never-ending search for the lowest wages and weakest regulations with an accompanying disappearance of jobs.

And this globalization, fueled by ‘free trade’ agreements that arise from relentless competition, aggravates global warming as components are shipped around the world for assembly into finished products that are shipped back, greatly adding to the environmental damage imposed by transportation.

Environment doesn’t count in orthodox economics

Not only is the environment an externality that corporations do not have to account for, thereby dumping the costs on to the public, but orthodox economics doesn’t account for the environment, other than as a source of resources to exploit.

The same capitalist market that is nothing more than the aggregate interests of the largest and most powerful industrialists and financiers is supposed to “solve” environmental problems. A Monthly Review article by sociologists Richard York, Brett Clark and John Bellamy Foster, ‘Capitalism in Wonderland‘, puts this contradiction in stark perspective:

“Mainstream economists are trained in the promotion of private profits as the singular ‘bottom line’ of society, even at the expense of larger issues of human welfare and the environment. The market rules over all, even nature.

“For Milton Friedman the environment was not a problem since the answer was simple and straightforward. As he put it: ‘ecological values can find their natural space in the market, like any other consumer demand.’ ” [May 2009, page 4]

From that perspective, it follows that present-day environmental damage is of minimal concern to capital and future damage of no concern. The industrialists and financiers who reap billions today won’t necessarily be around when the environmental price becomes too high to avoid. The ‘Capitalism in Wonderland’ authors write:

“[T]he ideology embedded in orthodox neoclassical economics [is] a field which regularly presents itself as using objective, even naturalistic, methods for modeling the economy. However, past all of the equations and technical jargon, the dominant economic paradigm is built on a value system that prizes capital accumulation in the short-term, while de-valuing everything else in the present and everything altogether in the future …

“[H]uman life in effect is worth only what each person contributes to the economy as measured in monetary terms. So, if global warming increases mortality in Bangladesh, which it appears likely that it will, this is only reflected in economic models to the extent that the deaths of Bengalis hurt the economy.

“Since Bangladesh is very poor, [orthodox] economic models … would not estimate it to be worthwhile to prevent deaths there since these losses would show up as minuscule in the measurements. … [E]thical concerns about the intrinsic value of human life and of the lives of other creatures are completely invisible in standard economic models.

“Increasing human mortality and accelerating the rate of extinctions are to most economists only problems if they undermine the ‘bottom line.’ In other respects they are invisible: as is the natural world as a whole.” [pages 9-10]

Tinkering versus analyzing the structure

The International Monetary Fund paper does offer a brief discussion of social disruptions should fossil-fuel subsidies be removed, suggesting a need for “transitory” programs such as worker retraining and protection of vulnerable groups. [page 31] But their proposed program centers on environmental taxes as a way to align fossil fuels with their costs to make energy prices “efficient”.

Certainly, polluters and causers of global warming should be required to absorb those costs. But given that market forces tilt overwhelmingly in favor of large polluters, the fact of massive imbalances in power, and that governments have handcuffed themselves in terms of confronting capital (a trend itself a product of market forces), it is unrealistic to believe such a program is currently politically feasible.

The disruptions to a capitalist economy with a forced large reduction in energy usage are also significant. It is not only that a capitalist economy can’t function without growing (and a growing economy uses more, not less, energy, especially because of ever more complex machinery and lengthening supply chains), but that a capitalist economy doesn’t offer millions of workers who lose their jobs new work in new industries.

Every incentive under capitalism is for more energy usage; thus ‘the market’ will object to dramatically higher energy prices, no matter how rational those higher prices.

Ultimately, the authors of the IMF paper are trapped in the same inability to imagine anything outside the present capitalist system, similar to those who claim that stopping global warming will be virtually cost-free.

Energy is way too important to be left to ‘the market’

Their paper has done a necessary service by providing the first real quantification of the gigantic costs of fossil fuels and the massive subsidies they receive. Subsidies for renewable energy, in comparison, are minuscule.

The massive subsidies for nuclear energy, which is a complete failure on any rational economic basis before we even get to the physical dangers, demonstrate that nuclear is no solution, either. These should also be eliminated.

The size of the social movement that would be necessary to eliminate all these subsidies would be enormous. Why should such a movement ask for mere reforms that fall well short of what is necessary, worthy as they would be.

Energy is too important not to be put in public hands. The trillions of dollars of fossil fuel subsidies are the logical product of allowing private interests to control critical resources for private profit and leaving ‘the market’ to dictate outcomes.

We can’t make what is unsustainable sustainable through a better tax policy. That the enormous scale of reform proposed by the IMF paper still falls far short of what is actually necessary to create a sustainable economy demonstrates the severity of the crises we are only beginning to face.

Pete Dolack writes the Systemic Disorder blog. He has been an activist with several groups.

This article was originally published on Systemic Disorder.

A new Greenpeace report, ‘Carbon Capture Scam (CCS): How a False Climate Solution Bolsters Big Oil‘, shows that carbon capture and sequestration (CCS) is significantly more expensive than renewable energy for attempting to reduce carbon pollution.

The technology works by chemically capturing CO₂ from the flue gases of power stations, then pumping it to places where it can be pumped underground – either to be stored or, all too often, to force extra oil out of flagging oil fields.

One problem with the technology is that it increases the amounts of fossil fuel that have to be burnt in CCS-fitted power stations by around 30% in order to drive the energy intensive processes. But of course that’s a boon for fossil fuel producers.

“Carbon capture could actually increase the overall climate pollution associated with fossil fuels by promoting increased extraction, combustion, and fugitive emissions”, says Greenpeace.

More than double the cost of wind power

The Greenpeace analysis uses US Energy Information Administration (EIA) cost projections for CCS and renewable energy to calculate relative costs of reducing carbon pollution, and shows how CCS only maintains dependence on fossil fuels and exacerbates greenhouse gas emissions.

Even using EIA’s optimistic assumptions about CCS effectiveness and costs, the report shows that CCS would still cost almost 40% more per kilogram of avoided carbon dioxide than solar photovoltaic, 125% more than wind and 260% more than geothermal.

It calculates that in 2019, based on EIA cost estimates, carbon capture and sequestration would cost 18 cents to avoid the emission of each kilogram of carbon dioxide per unit of electricity, while solar photovoltaics cost 13 cents, wind costs 8 cents, and geothermal costs 5 cents.

And as the cost of renewable energy continues to fall, the advantage of genuinely low carbon technologies like wind and solar will only increase.

“The truth is that carbon capture and sequestration is not worth the investment – sequestration is a gamble while carbon capture does nothing but prop up the oil industry”, said Greenpeace Legislative Representative Kyle Ash.

“Its price tag is further evidence that our focus should be on moving toward affordable renewable energy, not wasting time with false solutions.”

Propping up the oil industry, increasing oil recovery

CCS has been pushed as part of the Obama administration’s ‘all of the above’ energy strategy that has helped maintain our dependence on fossil fuels. The EPA’s proposed carbon rule requires that new coal plants capture CO₂, and emphasizes the CO₂ be used to augment oil extraction.

Oil rigs then pump the carbon dioxide underground so the oil expands and more is forced up the well. Rather than actually storing carbon, it comes right back up the well with the oil. Every major power plant CCS project in the United States intends to sell the scrubbed carbon to the oil extraction industry.

“There’s a reason that the oil industry is supportive of CO2 capture technology – it makes them more money and maintains our dependence on fossil fuels“, explaiined Ash. “It’s a win-win for coal and oil.

“The coal industry gets to greenwash its image, and the oil industry benefits from the captured carbon that’s harnessed for increasing oil extraction. This scandalous collusion between coal and oil also includes the Obama administration, which is wasting billions in taxpayer dollars on carbon capture while working to expand the extraction of coal, oil and gas.”

The UK government is also keen to progress CCS development and just awarded a £2.5 million contract for the identification of suitable CO2 storage sites.

Insecure carbon storage creates long term hazard

Even if permanent storage was the ultimate goal for the carbon, it has proven to be a dangerous and difficult task.

The locations that have been identified as having the greatest potential for carbon sequestration are in the same spots as fracking and shale gas reserves. Earthquakes as a result of fracking threaten the feasibility of those projects.

Additionally, CO₂ can lead to ‘downhole communication’, or ‘frack hits’, in which case the CO₂ injected into one hole just comes out another. When it comes to sequestering carbon permanently underground without the complications of oil and gas extraction, the science remains dubious.

A recent MIT study found that the majority of CO₂ injected into saline aquifers, the type of geology believed to have the greatest storage potential after exhausted oil wells, could make its way back to the surface.

And in the event of a large-scale release of CO₂ from an undergound storage reservoir, which could result from an earthquake or accidental damage, any person or animal caught in the cold, ground-clinging cloud of toxic CO₂ gas would die.

The report: ‘Carbon Capture Scam (CCS): How a False Climate Solution Bolsters Big Oil‘.

Background: Greenpeace’s 2014 ‘Energy [R]evolution‘ analysis shows that there is a path to an economy reliant on renewable energy without additional breakthrough technologies or reliance on false solutions like nuclear and CCS. Over the past 15 years, Greenpeace’s Energy [R]evolution analysis has more accurately predicted renewable energy growth than most, including the EIA, International Energy Agency, and others.

Dressed as brightly coloured tropical fish, campaigners from Divest London ‘shoaled’ in protest last week outside the Commonwealth Bank of Australia’s (CommBank) London offices.

A letter from the group explains that the bank was targeted over its plans to fund controversial coal projects that place the future of the Great Barrier Reef in doubt and threaten to seriously accelerate climate change.

CommBank “can show leadership and vote against this”, the letter states. “As a globally significant investment bank, CommBank can say no to Adani and join 11 other major global investment banks who’ve ruled out involvement in this project.

“Failing to do so will only draw further criticism of the Bank, further protests, more account closures and more reputational risk.”

The London action formed part of 350.org’s Raise the Heat week that has seen over 50 protests at CommBank branches worldwide.

The campaign is demanding that the institution follows the lead of all the other international banks that have refused to fund Adani’s Carmichael coal mine and Abbot Point coal port expansion in Queensland, Australia.

Save the reef, save the climate!

Campaigners, scientists and tourism bodies alike fear the development of these projects would have ruinous effects on the already stressed Great Barrier Reef.

According to Ove Hoegh-Guldberg, Director of the Global Change Institute at The University of Queensland, over 50% of the Great Barrier Reef’s coral is gone already, leaving it at severe risk of irreparable damage.

Hoegh-Guldberg says the reef’s fate is closely linked to that of the climate. “We know that adding more carbon dioxide to the atmosphere is extremely dangerous for the Great Barrier Reef … coal extracted from the Queensland landscape, if burned along with other fossil fuel reserves, will ensure the destruction of the Great Barrier Reef.”

Calling Adani’s plans “the most insane coal project in Australia”, Divest London campaigner Charlie Satow expressed the group’s solidarity with other Raise the Heat campaigners worldwide:

“We’ve got so much love for what you’re doing. We’ve seen it on twitter, we’ve watched the videos and it’s amazing. We hope we can help from ten thousand miles away!”

Many others share the same hope. The stakes could scarcely be higher.

Funding Australia’s 27 billion tonne ‘carbon bomb’

If fully developed Adani Coal’s £8.4bn Carmichael mine will produce 4.5 gigatonnes (billion tonnes) of CO₂ over its 60-year life span.

Released into the atmosphere it has two effects, each deadly to coral reefs in their own way. First it increases globalwarming, stressing and ultimately killing the coral. Second the CO₂ acidifies seawater making it harder for the coral organisms to form the calcium carbonate structures.

To make mining at Carmichael possible, Adani must ensure it can export its coal to markets in India and China. To do this it hopes to massively expand the coal port at Abbot Point, dredging a five million tonne channel through the Great Barrier Reef to create passage for giant ships. Adani also hopes to develop a new 189-kilometre railway to connect port and mine.

Between the 2008-14 period CommBank loaned $2.9 billion to fossil fuel projects in the Great Barrier Reef Heritage Area. So far the bank has refused to budge from it’s plans to fund Adani’s projects despite being a signatory to the Equator Principles that prohibit banks from funding projects that damage world heritage sites.

Speaking at the protest last Thursday, Hannah Martin, a campaigner with divest London and Reclaim the Power called on CommBank to respect its “duty to protect and care for the future of our environment.”

Alongside other campaigners present, she called on the bank to recognise the financial and reputational risk it faces through association with these projects:

“Coal is not the future of our energy system. You need to be looking to stop fossil fuel extraction now. We cannot afford it environmentally or in terms of cost. You’re create a massive carbon bubble that you will not profit from, so think about what you are doing, and stop!”

A total of six coal mines planned for the Galilee Basin

Though Adani’s Carmichael mine is set to be the largest project in the Galilee Basin, it will not be alone. Plans are a-foot for at least six new coal mines in the region. All are hoping to exploit a Goliath coal deposit covering 95,400 sq.km, an area the size of the UK.

If fully exploited, emissions from coal extracted and burnt from the basin would reach 700 million tonnes per year and 27 billion tonnes in total; a significant contribution to consuming the world’s remaining 500-800 gigatonne carbon budget.

Campaigners have identified stopping the Carmichael mine and Abbot Point expansion as keystones in the fight to prevent the ‘carbon bomb’ beneath Galilee Basin being detonated by the fossil fuel industry. If Adani cannot finance port expansion and a rail link, others are deemed unlikely to be able to, leaving companies without the ability to get coal from the basin to market.

There are promising signs that pressure applied in Australia and abroad to keep Queensland’s coal underground is paying off to Adani’s detriment. The global slump in coal prices also means that Adani are facing an uphill battle to justify the economics of the project to risk-averse investors.

Low prices, rising costs

The price of thermal coal is at an all-time low of around $60 per tonne. Despite Adani’s claims to have buyers for 70% of the coal it plans to extract at Carmichael, estimates suggest the price of coal would need to be closer to $100 per tonne to make the full operation economically viable. With China’s coal burn on a declining trend, this is looking increasingly improbable.

The company is also facing rising costs. Despite permitting dredging at Abbot Point, Queensland’s new Labour Government has ruled that Adani will have to pay for the process, withdrawing millions of dollar of taxpayer money and outlawing off-shore dumping of dredged material. The government has also withdrawn hundreds of millions of Australian dollars promised to fund Adani’s planned mine-port rail link.

Opposition from determined green groups like those uniting in to support Raise the Heat is toxifying association with Adani’s projects amongst investors.

So far eleven international banks have said they will not finance Abbot Point or the Carmichael mine, including HSBC, Deutsche Bank, Royal Bank of Scotland, Barclays, Citigroup, Morgan Stanley and Goldman Sachs.

The State Bank of India is understood to be on the verge of withdrawing $1 billion of support and if UNESCO decides to upgrade the Great Barrier Reef’s status to ‘in danger’ in the coming weeks, other banks who are signatories to the Equator Principles will be effectively be ruled out.

Keep it in the ground!

The ‘Raise the Heat’ campaign has turned the focus on CommBank, believing Adani will not get its project off the ground without support from an Australian bank.

Mark Howitz, a Divest London campaigner and CommBank shareholder gave his perspective in the midst of dancing fish and banners in central London:

“As a customer and a share holder of the Common Wealth Bank I don’t want the bank to be investing in something for people worldwide through contributing to climate change. I would like the bank to make money, I get dividends from it, but I don’t want them to do it at the cost of other peoples’ wellbeing”.

Speaking at a parallel protest in Sydney, 350.org campaigner Isaac Astill outlined what Australia stands to gain if the reef can be protected, pointing out that “the Great Barrier Reef provides 69,000 jobs, it’s a $6 billion industry and it’s one that will be there forever and ever as long as we preserve the Great Barrier Reef.”

Raise the Heat’s website clearly states that this week of action is just the start for CommBank. Protracted public protests and mass divestment are yet to come, thousands of customers have already left the bank in protest, and staff are feeling increasingly demoralised by their employer’s attitude.

Surely it is only a matter of time until CommBank wake up and decide to ‘keep it in the ground and get off the reef”, says campaigner Pekka Piiranen, emphatically.

Hal Rhoades is Communications and Advocacy Officer at the Gaia Foundation. He also writes for indigenous news journal Intercontinental Cry.

Divest London is a citizens’ movement, pushing institutions across the capital to divest from fossil fuels. We are part of the global Fossil Free divestment movement.

What percentage of UK energy demand do you think is generated by the UK’s nuclear power stations?

And what percentage of global energy demand do you think is generated by nuclear reactors worldwide?

The first part of the question above should now be occupying the minds of Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) and the Infrastructure Planning Committee (IPC).

Why? Because in April the proposers of a new nuclear power station at Moorside near Sellafield, put out an advertorial in all Cumbrian newspapers stating that the station would provide about “7% of the UK’s energy requirement”.

The company, NuGen, issued its first consultation newsletter on 8th April which likewise stated that the station would be capable of “providing approximately 7% of the UK’s current energy requirement.” [1]

The advertorial and newsletter had been timed to herald the start of a statutory public consultation process, now under way, about the proposed massive nuclear station which would have over three times the generating capacity of most existing UK nuclear stations.

So far so wrong. The company had printed the word ‘energy’ when the correct wording to match the figure should have been ‘electricity’. The Moorside leviathan would probably supply around 7% (in the 2030’s) of the UK’s post-2030 rising electricity demand [2]. However, the station would supply about 2% of future UK energy demand [3].

NuGen’s information was out by an ‘X factor’ of about 3.5, bigging up the strategic importance of the scheme. Within days, a group opposing the development wrote a complaint to the ASA [4].

The error that keeps on being repeated – is it more than just ignorance?

Yet does such an apparently simple wording mix-up matter ? Indeed, one regional newspaper which reported on the ASA complaint included a statement by NuGen which rightly referred to ‘7% of current electricity‘ calling it a ‘clarification‘ (though surely such a revision should be called a correction) [5].

NuGen issued a second newsletter, dated 28th April, which had corrected the error stating ‘7% of the UK’s future electricity requirement‘ [6].

So, it could be argued that, as far as the ASA is concerned, the error was a one-off typo with no lasting consequential effect considering the quickly clarified (corrected) response.

It could also be argued, as far as the IPC is concerned, that the error related to a strategic point which would not have a direct bearing on the local or regional planning issues which are the focus of the statutory public consultation process for such a strategically-agreed Nationally Significant Infrastructure Project (NSIP).

That said, transmitting even 7% of the nation’s electricity down one long transmission line spur (perhaps over 10% at night), would have very strategic implications.

However, this electricity-energy percentage mixup is far from an isolated incident. As an energy campaigner since the 1990s I have noticed this very error reoccuring in the media and in other information sources with alarming if not chilling frequency. The Moorside advertorial is the latest incidence of a wording mixup that has been highly advantageous to the nuclear industry.

That does matter, considering that the £ multi-hundred billion nuclear industry and UK political parties are promoting nuclear power as playing a key and crucial role in providing national and global energy security and avoiding dangerous climate change.

Tony Blair’s (and his officials’) tin ears

It is possible that PM Tony Blair or brain-faded officials were caught out by this electricity-energy mix-up at an EU Summit in March 2007.

The PM had signed the UK up to the EU’s 20% renewable energy by 2020 agreement possibly by mistake according to speculation by then Chief Scientific Advisor Sir David King [7]. That was my first thought on hearing the news not least because the 2003 UK Energy White Paper had a 20% renewable electricity by 2020 target [8].

Following subsequent negotiations (damage limitation) by civil servants and ministers the UK agreed to a still quite stretching share of 15% renewable energy by 2020 (15% of final energy demand implied over 30% renewable electricity). Some civil servants may well have been trying to get out of that commitment ever since.

Blair’s officials should have been alert to the word trap. In December 2005 Friends of the Earth Cymru had submitted written evidence to the Welsh Affairs Select Committee which stated that nuclear stations supplied just 3.2% of UK energy in 2004 [9].

In 2006 I worked out UK nuclear output as a percentage of final energy demand, 3.6% in 2005, had it confirmed by the Government’s ‘DUKES’ energy-statistics team, and had set about raising media awareness at every opportunity.

By July 2006 the Guardian was mentioning nuclear’s 3.6% energy contribution [10]. Yet, the May 2007 Energy White Paper stated that ‘Nuclear power currently accounts for approximately 18% of our electricity generation and 7.5% of total UK energy supplies.‘ [11]

Fellow campaigners in Greenpeace weighed in pointing out nuclear’s 3.6% energy contribution in their response to the paper [12]. But officials were still not listening. In a major speech on the environment to the Foreign Press Association on 19th November 2007 Gordon Brown relayed globally ‘At present around 9 percent of total energy in Britain is from low carbon sources: 2% from renewables, and 7.5% from nuclear.‘ [13]

The primary energy loophole – used by DECC to overstate nuclear energy importance

Within days the 7.5% figure was questioned by Dai Davies MP. In a written response by energy secretary Malcolm Wicks the 7.5% figure was explained as a ‘primary energy’ comparison and it was followed by a comparison of nuclear output to final energy of, wait for it, 3.5% [14].

I met Mr Wicks soon after and raised the issue again. Was it worth the effort? Well, he became the PM’s special representative on international energy issues in 2008. Sadly, he died in 2012.

Why such a difference between a ‘primary energy’ and ‘final energy’ comparison. The primary energy comparison compares the energy content of the uranium fuel before conversion losses to the nation’s fuel energy demand before conversion losses [15].

Such comparisons don’t account for nuclear power stations thermal efficiency (typically 35%) or the electricity used by the station (typically 7% of that generated), and then don’t relate to actual consumer energy use. So they mislead probably 99.99% of public and politicians and benefit or big-up nuclear power by an X factor of about 2.

Primary energy comparisons also disbenefit renewable energy sources because most (eg PV, windfarms, tidal lagoons) generate electricity directly with no thermal losses. So to express the contribution of these renewables correctly in terms of ‘primary energy’ the electrical output should be multiplied by a ‘renewable X factor’ of about 3. Does DECC do this? Of course not.

Likewise none of the major international or national energy agencies (eg IEA, IAEA, WEC, WNA, HMG’s DUKES) include nuclear output as a percentage of final energy demand in their voluminous and detailed publications. When questioned about such an obvious omission, shoulders are just shrugged.

All the nuclear comparisons and percentages relate to electricity demand and climate emissions. That’s why the electricity-energy mix-up has made nuclear look bigger than it is. I have never seen the error work the other way, under-reporting the percentage contribution of a nuclear power station or programme.

So here are the real figures …

In the Moorside case the 2% number would simply not appear because it would not have been calculated, let alone included in pro-nuclear PR. It was the 7% number that awaited loose talk and non-the-wiser journalists.

So, nuclear power’s contribution to UK final energy demand was just 3.8% in 2013 [16]. France, the world-leading nuclear examplar, is generating 23% of its final energy from nuclear power – not 80% as many may have read or heard [17].

Even the UK’s planned 16 GW new-build programme would only generate about 9% (120 TWh/y) of future energy demand (eg 1,300 TWh/y in 2030). A 3.3 GW Chinese project at Bradwell, linked to any Hinkley C deal, would add 2% [18].

The same 11% of energy could be generated, with no uranium imports, by about 39 GW of fixed and floating offshore wind turbines on or beyond the hazy horizon. The UK’s practical offshore wind resource is estimated at around 1,500 TWh/y for floating structures and 400 TWh/y for fixed structures, which is probably higher than any future UK energy need [20].

Wind costs would probably be lower too ‘with £85 /MWh a conservative forecast by 2025‘ for floating schemes [19]. After adding in the additional balancing costs, including about 3 GW or so of decentralised gas-fired backup which itself would add valuable Grid strength and security, the system cost would be lower than Hinkley C’s 35 year CfD by the time it opened.

There would probably be more jobs too overall, especially from Hull to Holyhead to Holyrood. Now there’s a ‘northern powerhouse’!

If the government wants to boost low carbon energy, go slow on nuclear

Indeed, with the distraction of any locally opposed onshore windfarms dealt with Cameron and Osborne can now survey the much bigger picture. Consenting the five planned nuclear projects would devastate Britain’s offshore wind industry potential. A sixth Chinese station would be a coup-de-grace.

So they have the opportunity to outflank the other major parties on green issues by at least deferring any nuclear consents to give PV and offshore wind their chance.

Surely Rudd and Clark can better spend Ed Davey’s give-away £1 billion per year Capacity Mechanism fund to build 12+ GW of dispersed back-up capacity in a way which empowers local businesses and Councils by seeding district heat networks and other initiatives?

On the international front, nuclear power’s contribution to global energy demand was a tiny 2.4% in 2012 [21]. Although new reactors are being built many existing stations are ageing and energy demand is rising. So nuclear power will probably struggle to increase its percentage global energy supply.

The main international energy agencies are optimistically forecasting around 7,000 TWh/y of global nuclear output in 2050 compared to 2,400 TWh/y in 2014 [22]. So even this near three-fold increase in nuclear capacity worldwide would only supply around 4.4% of final energy in 2050 even if global energy demand flattened around 160,000 TWh/y [23].

The UK is currently bending over backwards to globally showcase, if not export, a marginal, toxic technology, despite its rising security and proliferation risks, as a key energy security and climate solution. The same Low Carbon Fund could be spent promoting benign renewables and non-proliferation.

Minds of clay

Britannia is at a fork in her journey. Future generations would not thank the UK for promoting the spread of nuclear technology, expertise and materials around the world. The peoples of the British Isles and Commonwealth should take a path towards a safer non-nuclear world, however many generations it may take.

The prospects, let alone Pandorian promises, for significant next-generation waste-burning ‘fast’ reactor deployment before 2050, if ever, look small [24]. George Monbiot should be more careful when he says that the UK’s nuclear waste ‘could produce enough energy to power the UK for 500 years‘ [25].

DECC’s Chief Adviser David Mackay was referring to current electricity demand, not energy [26]. Monbiot’s comment had an X factor of 3.5 – and the wind will blow far longer in any event.

So, beware the nuclear X factor, false impressions caused by oft-repeated mix-ups caused by official and lay complacency, count. The public would have a dim view of grand energy plans envisaged in inches and built in centimeters. Seemingly simple errors can matter big-time, especially in the nuclear industry, more so adjacent the Sellafield site.

The ASA and the IPC have an interest and duty to ensure that the X factor is 1 in the minds of public and politicians. The Government’s DUKES team and the international energy agencies should revise their fossilised habits.

Perhaps too, one day soon, the BBC and other media will report nuclear power’s contribution as a percentage of final energy demand in their duty to inform the public.

So next time the nuclear energy X factor looms large, keep calm, and rise up to make the point that British sea power is bigger, stronger, safer and tradable.

Neil Crumpton is representative for Pobol Atal Wylfa B on the DECC-NGO nuclear Forum and ONR stakeholder group, ex Friends of the Earth Cymru energy campaigner (1994-2010), ex Bellona Foundation UK energy campaigner.

References

1. http://www.nugenconsultation.com/media/1085/moorside-newsletter-edition-1-final.pdf

2. NuGen’s plans are for three AP1000 reactors totalling 3.4 GW would supply about 25 to 27 TWh per year of electricity to the Grid if the reactors achieved an average 85 to 90% ‘baseload’ capacity factor (eg 3.4 x 8.76 x 85 to 90% = 25.3 to 26.8).

National Grid’s latest 2030 UK electricity demand scenarios (average of the four) show electricity demand around 350 TWh per year in 2030 rising thereafter due to increasing electricity use in the heat and transport sectors. So it is reasonable to state that the 3.4 GW project would generate about 7% of electricity in the 2030s (eg 26 / 370 TWh/y = 7%). Various UK energy forecasts have suggested an increase from the current 350 TWh/y electricity demand to between 400-500 TWh/y or more by 2050. So Moorside’s percentage contribution would be a reducing figure year on year, possibly down to around 5% by 2050.

3. UK ‘final energy demand’ (electricity, heat, transport) could well fall from around 1,700 TWh per year currently due to efficiency and technology improvements to flatten off around the 1,300 TWh per year mark by 2030 before rising slowly to 2050 depending on population growth (excluding international aviation and shipping and exports) : https://www.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/42562/216-2050-pathways-analysis-report.pdf

So it could be said that the Moorside site would probably supply about 2% of future UK energy demand at best (ie 26.8 / 1,300 = 2.06% though it could be as low as about 1.7% (eg 25.3 / 1,500) by 2050.

4. https://mariannewildart.wordpress.com/2015/04/23/liar-liar-pants-on-fire-moorside-will-produce-7-of-the-uks-energy-rubbish/

5. http://www.newsandstar.co.uk/news/complaint-over-cumbrian-nuclear-advert-1.1208515

6. http://www.nugenconsultation.com/media/1088/moorside-newsletter-edition-2-final.pdf

7. http://blogs.independent.co.uk/2012/01/03/blair-agreed-to-green-energy-target-by-mistake/

8. 20% electricity by 2020, Feb 03 White Paper, para 4.11, page 46 : http://webarchive.nationalarchives.gov.uk/+/http:/www.berr.gov.uk/files/file10719.pdf

9. FOE Evidence, Reference 9 last page ( 17% x 19% from DUKES 2005 = 3.2% in 2004) http://www.parliament.the-stationery-office.co.uk/pa/cm200506/cmselect/cmwelaf/876/6031408.htm

10. http://www.theguardian.com/society/2006/jul/19/guardiansocietysupplement3

11. 7.5% of total energy needs, May 07 White Paper, page 15 https://www.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/243268/7124.pdf

12. May 2007 Greenpeace Blog and Media Briefing : http://www.greenpeace.org.uk/blog/about/why-tony-blair-is-wrong-about-nuclear-power-20070523, http://www.greenpeace.org.uk/files/pdfs/climate/energywhitepaper_briefing2.pdf

13. http://www.politics.co.uk/news/2007/11/19/gordon-brown-s-speech-in-full

14. Hansard, 27 th Nov 2007 Column 291 W : http://www.publications.parliament.uk/pa/cm200708/cmhansrd/cm071127/text/71127w0002.htm

15. Nuclear Energy Stats, Table 2 page 12 : http://www.google.co.uk/search?client=safari&rls=en&q=nuclear+energy+statistics+house+of+commons+library+2013&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8&gfe_rd=cr&ei=rGZVVbP1N4LFaMXXgPAK

16. DUKES (Digest of UK Energy Statistics) 2014 : https://www.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/338750/DUKES_2014_printed.pdf Table 5.5 page 139, nuclear supplied 64.134 TWh/y. Final Energy Demand was 1,692 TWh/y in 2013 including 37 TWh/y in distribution losses (66.5% + 1.5% of primary supply) Chart 1.4, page 14. So the 2013% nuclear contribution is 64.134 / 1,692 TWh = 3.8% of final energy demand, and 64.134 / 341.263 TWh = 18.8% of electricity demand

Note : the World Nuclear Association claim on their website that 70.6 TWh of nuclear electricity was ‘produced’ in the UK in 2013 ( http://www.world-nuclear.org/info/Country-Profiles/Countries-T-Z/United-Kingdom/ ). However, 6.5 TWh of that was used by the station itself (for cooling pumps etc) and only 64.1 TWh was supplied to the Grid.

17. French stats : https://www2.deloitte.com/content/dam/Deloitte/global/Documents/Energy-and-Resources/gx-er-merket-reform-france.pdf

18. http://www.theguardian.com/business/2015/feb/12/edf-energy-delays-hinkley-point-nuclear-decision

19. ETI ‘PelaStar’ Executive Summary : http://www.eti.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2014/03/PelaStar-LCOE-Paper-21-Jan-2014.pdf

20. page 13 : http://www.ppaenergy.co.uk/web-resources/resources/467ac5b8919.pdf

21. nuclear energy output was 2,411 TWh/y in 2014 : http://www.world-nuclear.org/info/Facts-and-Figures/World-Nuclear-Power-Reactors-and-Uranium-Requirements/ Nuclear output was 2,461 TWh/y in 2012 and global final energy demand was 104,400 TWh/y in 2012 (8,979 mtoe x 11.63) pages 16 and page 30 in IEA’s Key World Energy Stats 2014 : http://www.iea.org/publications/freepublications/publication/KeyWorld2014.pdf So nuclear contribution to global energy demand (2,461/104,400) = 2.36% in 2012

22. http://www.world-nuclear.org/info/Current-and-Future-Generation/World-Energy-Needs-and-Nuclear-Power/ : the IAEA’s 2014 central estimate is 750 GW which would produce around 6,000 TWh/y and the hi-scenario generating around 8,500 TWh/y, the NEA-IEA 2015 Technology Roadmap estimates 930 GW which would generate around 7,000 TWh/y

23. by 2050 global final energy demand is forecast to be between 150,000 to 200,000 TWh/y : http://www.worldenergy.org/wp-content/uploads/2013/09/World-Energy-Scenarios_Composing-energy-futures-to-2050_Executive-summary.pdf Assuming a global final energy demand of 160,000 TWh/y in 2050 then a nuclear contribution of 7,000 TWh/y would comprise about 4.4% of global energy demand

24. http://www.irsn.fr/EN/newsroom/News/Pages/20150427_Generation-IV-nuclear-energy-systems-safety-potential-overview.aspx

25. http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2014/apr/28/arrested-myself-supporting-nuclear-power-george-monbiot

26. http://www.theguardian.com/environment/2012/feb/02/nuclear-reactors-consume-radioactive-waste

The UK doggedly maintains an ‘independent nuclear deterrent’ but a naval officer has blown the whistle on the system’s inherent insecurity-with its potentially incalculable implications.

The Royal Navy might have hoped that the detention on 18 May of Able Seaman William McNeilly, who had just revealed the poor security of Britain’s submarine-based nuclear weapons system, might bury the issue of its safety in public.

If so, it was not reckoning with the capacity of the massively enlarged contingent of Scottish National Party MPs, following the general election, to make hay at Westminster – the four Trident submarines are based at Faslane in Scotland and the SNP had made opposition to the system’s expensive replacement a campaigning focus. Now it has secured a debate on Trident safety this week, on Thursday 28th May.

This is not just a Scottish concern: it brings into question whether the UK is the responsible nuclear weapons state it presents itself to be. McNeilly claimed a disaster was waiting to happen, which might not just affect those manning the submarines.

A fundamental re-assessment is needed

The navy will no doubt attempt to rectify many of the problems and reassure the public via the government benches on Thursday. But these revelations expose muddled thinking around the need for continuous patrolling – one submarine is supposed to be at sea at all times, with the other three undergoing refit or being used for training – and highlight the need for a reassessment by the new government.

While the navy categorically denied the charges, there were no doubt a lot of red faces in the senior service. McNeilly’s claims included shockingly lax security arrangements on shore and on the at-sea submarine, which would open up nuclear weapons operations to insider attack.

They involved disturbing and willful neglect of safety measures on board, threatening fire and other lethal accidents. They also highlighted the willingness to go to sea with faulty systems and a disregard of alarms, compromising the smooth, safe and stealthy operation of the submarine. When these breaches were pointed out to senior staff, however, they were largely ignored.

The navy and regulators will be all over the case in the coming days, urgently reviewing management, safety and security protocols. They may find scapegoats, at least internally. They will also need to brief whichever junior minister is appointed to defend the service on Thursday on their improvements. Yet these will have unintended, negative side-effects.

‘More security’ is not a cost-free option

Stricter security protocols are expensive and intrusive, and leave those subject to them experiencing inconvenience and feeling resentment. The navy demands a great deal from its submariners, and recruitment and retention is already a problem.

Could, for instance, the more effective enforcement of regulations banning the use of electronics on board in most areas (including living quarters) affect morale?

If the UK is to field such dangerous and highly complex systems the rational approach must include expensive and robust arrangements to minimise the potentially horrific risks.

McNeilly described a practice of removing fire-fighting equipment from the submarine when in port, so that it was more easily accessible for teams entering the submarine to respond to any incident, and was incredulous that in a system costing billions each year such cost-saving practices could be pursued. But forced to endure months under the water in unpleasant incarceration, it is no wonder they cut corners for an easier life.

There are also conflicts with other objectives. As John Borrie pointed out in a Chatham House blog post, readiness and alert status rub up against safety and security.

This was particularly clear during the Cold War, when corners were cut in terrifying and reckless ways, in the race to achieve capability against what was seen as an urgent and very potent Soviet threat. It was a minor miracle that numerous accidents did not result in a nuclear catastrophe.

British submarines may now be at lower levels of alert but, as the BASIC Trident Commissionheard in evidence, their nuclear payloads could be launched in upwards of just 15 minutes.

Yet there are also problems which arise because the Trident mission has not been clear since the Soviet Union collapsed. McNeilly described human error and complacency, inevitable in a system thankfully never tested in combat since it began almost 50 years ago (with the prior Polaris submarines).

No amount of training or indoctrination can force human beings to operate inconvenient procedures when they do not see the point, particularly when there is no immediate threat or identified enemy.

In the absence of any imminent threat, what is non-stop patrolling for?

Some familiar with the submarine service claim that to drop continuous patrolling would harm morale.

But the clear implication of McNeilly’s testimony is that, while submariners may believe in the continuing need for a British nuclear weapons capability, many on patrol have lost any sense of its particular rationale for them – because, with no strategic threat to the UK and no chance of engagement, there is none.

If the UK is to maintain Trident submarines in a responsible and cost-effective manner, it is time for the posture to reflect the threat level. Occasional patrols should have particular purposes – training and testing in maintaining the systems for a possible future when patrols could actively deter a real and present threat.

No doubt the Government will, this coming Thursday, use this story to convince MPs that the Vanguard-class submarines will soon require replacing, and that there is no time to waste in bringing forward the construction and deployment of their successors.

But this would be completely to miss the point. Any institutional reassurance that these systems are foolproof must be treated with scepticism.

There is no such thing as a completely safe and secure system – particularly one involving such technical complexity, that relies on highly demanding human management, and where the implications of any shortfall could be so immeasurably destructive.

Paul Ingram has been executive director of the British American Security Information Council (BASIC) since 2007. BASIC works in the US, the UK, Europe and the middle east to promote global nuclear disarmament and a transformation in strategic relationships using a dialogue approach. Paul was also until recently a talk show host on state Iranian TV promoting alternative perspectives on strategic matters, and taught British senior civil servants leadership skills. Previously Paul was co-leader of Oxford City Council (2000-02) and a member of the Stop the War Coalition Steering Group (2002-06).

See also William McNeilly’s report: ‘Trident nuclear accidents and terrorism are the greatest threats we face‘.

This article was originally published by openDemocracy under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 3.0 licence.

Antarctica’s glaciers have been making headlines during the past year, and not in a good way.

Whether it’s a massive ice shelf facing imminent risk of collapse, glaciers in the West Antarctic past the point of no return, or new threats to East Antarctic ice, it’s all been rather gloomy.

And now I’m afraid there’s more bad news: a new study published in the journal Science, led by a team of my colleagues and I from the University of Bristol, has observed a sudden increase of ice loss in a previously stable part of Antarctica.

The region in question is the southernmost half of the Antarctic Peninsula, a section of the mainland which extends 1,300km into the Southern Ocean.

Its northern half is the continent’s mildest region and the climate effects there are clear. We already knew for instance that the glaciers of the Northern Antarctic Peninsula were in trouble following the disintegration of some of its ice shelves, most famously Larsen A and B.

Further to the west, the massive glaciers feeding into the Amundsen Sea have been shedding ice into the ocean at an alarming rate for decades. Out of the blue, the Southern Peninsula filled up the gap between these two regions and became Antarctica’s second largest contributor to sea level rise.

Using satellite elevation measurements, we found the Southern Antarctic Peninsula showed no signs of change up to 2009. Around that year, multiple glaciers along a vast 750km coastline suddenly started to shed ice into the ocean at a nearly constant rate of 60 cubic km, or about 55 trillion litres of water, each year. That’s enough water to fill 350,000 Empire State Buildings over the past five years.

Some of the glaciers are currently thinning by as much as 4 metres each year. The ice loss in the region is so large that it causes small changes in the Earth’s gravity field, which can be detected by another satellite mission, the Gravity Recovery and Climate Experiment (GRACE).

Is this an effect of global warming?

The answer is both yes and no. Data from an Antarctic climate model shows that the sudden change cannot be explained by changes in snowfall or air temperature. Instead, we attribute the rapid ice loss to warming oceans.

Many of the glaciers in the region feed into ice shelves that float on the surface of the ocean. They act as a buttress to the ice resting on bedrock inland, slowing down the flow of the glaciers into the ocean.

The westerly winds that encircle Antarctica have become more vigorous in recent decades, in response to climate warming and ozone depletion. The stronger winds push warm waters from the Southern Ocean poleward, where they eat away at the glaciers and floating ice shelves from below.

Ice shelves in the region have lost almost one-fifth of their thickness in the last two decades, thereby reducing the resisting force on the glaciers.

A key concern is that much of the ice of the Southern Antarctic Peninsula is grounded on bedrock below sea level, which gets deeper inland. This means that even if the glaciers retreat, the warm water will chase them inland and melt them even more.

In just a few years, everything changed. What next?

The region’s melting glaciers are currently adding about 0.16 millimetres to global sea levels per year, which won’t immediately make you run for the hills. But it’s yet another source of sea level rise, about 5% of the global total increase.

What might be a bigger source of concern is that the changes occurred so suddenly and in an area that was behaving quietly until now. The fact that so many glaciers in such a large region suddenly started to lose ice came as a surprise. It shows a very fast response of the ice sheet: in just a few years everything changed.

The Southern Antarctic Peninsula contains enough ice to add 35 cm to sea level, but that won’t happen any time soon. It’s too early to tell how much longer the ice loss will continue and how much it will contribute to future sea level rise.

For this, a detailed knowledge of the geometry of the local ice shelves, the ocean floor topography, ice sheet thickness and glacier flow speeds are crucial.

But the ice on Antarctica is like a sleeping giant. Even if we would stop emitting greenhouse gases as of today, or the inflow of warm water would stop, this inert system would take a long time to find an equilibrium again.

The paper: ‘Dynamic thinning of glaciers on the Southern Antarctic Peninsula‘ by B. Wouters et al is published in Science.

Bert Wouters is Marie Curie Research Fellow in Geographical Sciences at the University of Bristol.

This article was originally published on The Conversation. Read the original article.

In 2009 the Conservative party unveiled their new international aid agenda and stated:

“Capitalism and development was Britain’s gift to the world. Today we have an opportunity to renew that gift by helping poor countries kick-start growth and development.”

Six years and hundreds of millions of pounds of taxpayers’ money later, we have the first formal and independent assessment of the Department for International Development’s (DfID) strategy of increasingly working with, and through the private sector to address poverty and inequality.

It turns out that working with Coca Coca Cola and paying Diageo to make Guinness in Cameroon don’t seem to be effective ways of delivering development benefits. Who knew?

Poor effectiveness, poor value for money

The Independent Commission for Aid Impact (ICAI) has today released an audit of DfiD’s business partnership programme. It was given an overall ‘amber-red’ rating – meaning that it was performing “relatively poorly against ICAI’s criteria for effectiveness and value for money.”

The same ‘amber-red’ rating was also given to the objectives, delivery, impact and learning assessments of the programme.