Last week, it was reported that the UN is running a competition to find a number of young people to ‘vent their frustration’ at politicians for their failure to take decisive action against climate change (UN seeks ‘Malala’ on climate change). Thirty-eight will be selected to attend the next UN climate change summit in New York, another in a series of negotiating sessions leading up to the next Conference of the Parties in Paris where, yet again, there are hopes of a further significant agreement on global emissions reduction. One entrant, who must be a woman under 30, will have the opportunity to speak to the General Assembly.
It seems that many of the 500+ entrants to the competition are climate change campaigners, which is hardly surprising. The chosen 38 and, in particular, the young woman who gets to make the address, will be mainly preaching to the converted, or at least those who pay lip service to the prevailing orthodoxy that we are causing dangerous, unprecedented climate change which must be mitigated by radical cuts in emissions of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases.
The EU 20-20-20 goals are part of this effort. They do not simply set a target of a 20% reduction in carbon dioxide emissions by 2020, but specify at the same time a 20% use of renewable energy and a 20% increase in energy efficiency. Such goals may be eye-catching, but politicians rarely seem to think about their implications. The renewable energy goal has, in practical terms, to be fulfilled mainly in the electricity generating sector, which therefore has to try to meet far more demanding goals. It is generally believed that many politicians failed to realise the crucial distinction between total energy and electricity when signing up to this.
On the energy efficiency front, we have all become used to the rating of anything from light bulbs to washing machines, but the latest change to have caused some controversy is the banning of the manufacture or import of vacuum cleaners with motors larger than 1600 watts from the beginning of September.
Limits on the power of cleaners may soon be followed by restrictions on the power consumption of other domestic electrical equipment such as kettles, lawn mowers and hairdryers (High-powered hairdryers under threat as EU considers ban). This has predictably led to outrage in the popular press (Now EU targets hairdryers and lawn mowers: Brussels set to introduce ban on devices to meet energy efficiency targets).
The source of the story is a long report from Deloitte for the European Commission, with the rather prosaic title of Preparatory Study to establish the Ecodesign Working Plan 2015-2017 implementing Directive 2009/125/EC: Draft Task 3 Report. This analyses a wide range of product groups in terms of the potential for energy saving. For kettles, for example, it looks at really quite sensible aspects such as the thermal capacity, the time for power to switch off when the water has boiled and the rather important issue of durability.
It is difficult to argue with the concept of improving product design to increase efficiency. After all, most white goods use considerably less electricity now than they did a decade or two ago and yet perform at least as well. However, taking the option of banning devices over a certain power seems rather heavy handed and poorly thought out.
The first effect, as always, is to create a rush of people buying up the more powerful models before they are removed from the shops. It would be naïve to think that manufacturers did not already have extra stocks waiting in the warehouse to meet the demand. Any energy saving is going to be phased in over quite a long period of time.
This is exactly what happened with the banning of higher-powered incandescent light bulbs. Many people have significant stocks in their cupboards and will continue to use them for many years to avoid using the compact fluorescent bulbs which they dislike. A loophole also allows industrial grade filament bulbs to continue to be sold. By the time domestic stocks run out, it is likely that LED lights will be becoming the norm, with many consumers having missed out a whole generation of more efficient but unpopular technology.
As for kettles, the same amount of heat must be used to bring a given volume of water to boiling point however it is generated; if the kettle is lower-powered, it simply takes longer, with more heat being lost to the surroundings in the meantime. Hairdryers may be an intermediate case, with both power and overall design having a significant part to play. Overall, though, it is hairstyles and frequency of washing which will dominate energy consumption.
This detailed redesign of common equipment is an inevitable result of setting an unnecessary quantitative goal on energy efficiency, just as the rash of wind farms and solar panels across the countryside is a direct consequence of a renewable energy target, to be fulfilled even though a carbon tax would be a far more efficient way to reduce fossil fuel use and carbon dioxide emissions.
This perceived micro-managing of people’s lives reduces the credibility of official efforts to meet emissions reduction targets and makes stunts like the UN’s competition for young climate change campaigners more likely. After the failure of the Copenhagen summit and the realisation that development remains top priority for emerging economies, campaigners are struggling hard to reverse the loss of momentum towards their holy grail of a global climate change agreement.
If governments and world leaders want to take the majority of people with them, they need to stop both the micro-management and the gesture politics and focus efforts on practical, cost-effective measures which can make a difference. Better to do nothing than pour taxpayers’ money into policies which achieve nothing.
Martin Livermore
The Scientific Alliance
St John’s Innovation Centre
Cowley Road
Cambridge CB4 0WS
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