Commentaries

Rewewables: Time for a Rethink?

16th June 2008 commentary

To some, renewables are—with energy efficiency—the solution to climate change. That, in effect, is what the government believed when it set out its energy policy in the 2003 White Paper. To others, they are at best an irrelevance when set against the great global expansion of coal and the 50% increase in carbon emissions projected for 2030 by the IEA. Neither position turns out to be correct, but in the presence of so much lobbying and political positioning, good policy tends to get lost in the debate about the role of renewables in climate change policy.