Watch @bathnes council pass their climate emergency motion incl opposition to expansion of Bristol Airport. Fantastic cross-party support & commitment https://t.co/U9UvvCtZJs (vote at 3.06:15). We look forward to working with them on meaningful programme of participation & action
— CSE (@cse_bristol) March 15, 2019
The Joint motion from Councillor Rob Appleyard (Liberal Democrat) and Councillor Mark Shelford
(Conservative): Bath and North East Somerset Declaring a Climate Emergency and Joining UK100 Club
This Council acknowledges;
● The devastating impacts that climate change and global temperature increases will have on the lives and livelihoods of people around the world, including on the health, safety and wellbeing of B&NES residents;
● The urgent need for action to be taken fast enough for there to be a chance of further climate
change being limited to avoid the worst impacts of drought, floods, extreme heat and poverty
for hundreds of millions of people;
● The opportunity for individuals and organisations at all levels to take action on reducing carbon emissions, from both production and consumption;
● The need to enable low carbon living across society through changes to laws, taxation,
infrastructure, policies and plans;
● The historic commitments made at the 2015 United Nations Climate Change Conference in Paris regarding the future of renewable energy;
● That global temperatures have already increased by 1oC compared to pre-industrial levels, are still rising, and are on track to overshoot the Paris Agreement limit before 2050;
● That the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change’s Special Report (November 2018) makes
clear the need to ensure global carbon emissions start to decline well before 2030 to avoid
overshoot and enable global warming to be limited to 1.5˚C;
● Our responsibility to help secure an environmentally sustainable future for our residents and in relation to the global effects of anthropogenic climate change.
This Council subsequently notes that;
● Despite the Paris Agreement placing no binding commitments upon local government
institutions, we as a Council can still play our part in the global movement towards a sustainable
energy future, this is evidenced in recent reports which show with ambitious action from
national and sub-national authorities, civil society, the private sector, indigenous peoples and
local communities, further climate change can be limited;
● The UK is well placed to contribute to this, drawing upon our existing industrial base, rooted in
an industrial heritage which once before revolutionised the global energy economy to the great
benefit of humankind;
● B&NES is well-placed to champion both rural and urban decarbonisation through renewable
energy, energy efficiency, smart energy development, zero carbon homes, local & sustainable
food, sustainable travel, carbon sequestration;
● The Council is already working on a number of these issues including, for example, work to
ensure the new Local Plan ensures zero carbon development and that the Council-owned ACL
builds its new homes to that standard;
● More needs to be done to enable Bath and wider area’s high number of listed buildings to be
made more energy efficient, through pressure on central government and Heritage England;
● The development of green industries can deliver economic benefits through creating well-paid,
high-skilled employment locally, regionally and nationally as well as improved wellbeing for
people worldwide;
● The West of England Energy Strategy Framework has been agreed as a starting point for
developing ambitious plans to support action on climate change;
● The UK100 Agreement pledge includes the ambition to enable all the UK’s cities, towns, villages and rural areas to exceed the Paris Climate targets through achieving 100% ‘clean energy’ before 2050, but in discussion have agreed to support B&NES aiming to achieve the pledge by 2030.
Therefore, this Council resolves to;
Declare a Climate Emergency;
Pledge to provide the leadership to enable Bath & North East Somerset to become carbon
neutral by 2030;
Sign up to the UK100 Pledge to provide the strategic community leadership needed to enable
our communities to achieve 100% clean energy across all sectors in Bath & North East Somerset
by 2030, as a logical step from the B&NES Environmental Sustainability Vision Motion passed
unanimously by Council in July 2018, and as a way to enable carbon neutrality by 2030;
Request that the Cabinet takes steps to identify work streams and budgets with the aim of
making B&NES Council carbon neutral by 2030, across all functions, as our contribution to
fighting climate change;
Engage and work in partnership with our partners in the public, private and community sectors
including the West of England Combined Authority and central government to facilitate bold
action to ensure Bath & North East Somerset is able to play its role in helping the UK to deliver
against the commitments made nationally and internationally at the 2015 Paris Summit;
Instruct Cabinet to work with the West of England Combined Authority (WECA) and our West of
England partners to produce an ambitious delivery plan for the West of England Energy Strategy
to use as a key tool for seeking government funding to help us deliver our 2030 target;
Update the B&NES Environmental Sustainability & Climate Change Strategy in line with this
pledge, and, with our partners across the community, to develop an action plan and ‘route
map’ to a sustainable, low carbon future for our community;
Request a report to Council in 6 months’ time on the progress with an annual report on
progress to full Council thereafter;
Launch real two-way engagement with the public to:
o Improve “carbon literacy” of all citizens;
o Encourage and support leadership on this issue in all sectors of society;
o Obtain meaningful public input into the B&NES Environmental Sustainability & Climate
Change Strategy and action planning;
o Facilitate wide community engagement and behavioural change.
The Petition signed by 2100 people:
We the undersigned are petitioning Bath and North East Somerset Council because:
1. Humans have already caused irreversible climate change, the impacts of which are being felt around the world. Global temperatures have already increased by 1 degree Celsius from pre-industrial levels. Atmospheric CO2 levels are above 400 parts per million (ppm). This far exceeds the 350 ppm deemed to be a safe level for humanity;
2. In order to reduce the chance of runaway Global Warming and limit the effects of Climate Breakdown, it is imperative that we as a species reduce our CO2eq (carbon equivalent) emissions from their current 6.5 tonnes per person per year to less than 2 tonnes as soon as possible;
3. Individuals cannot be expected to make this reduction on their own. Society needs to change its laws, taxation,
infrastructure, etc., to make low carbon living easier and the new norm;
4. Carbon emissions result from both production and consumption;
5. Bath and North East Somerset Council has already shown foresight and leadership when it comes to addressing the issue of Climate Breakdown by supporting the Our Power in B&NES green local energy scheme, the success of the waste recycling changes, and working with WECA to roll-out electric car charging points;
6. Unfortunately, our current plans and actions are not enough. The world is on track to overshoot the Paris Agreement’s 1.5°C limit before 2050;
7. The IPCC’s Special Report on Global Warming of 1.5°C, published in October, describes the enormous harm that a 2°C rise is likely to cause compared to a 1.5°C rise, and told us that limiting Global Warming to 1.5°C may still be possible with ambitious action from national and sub-national authorities, civil society, the private sector, indigenous peoples and local communities;
8. Councils around the world are responding by declaring a ‘Climate Emergency’ and committing resources to address this emergency.
References:
1. Fossil CO2 & GHG emissions of all world countries, 2017:
http://edgar.jrc.ec.europa.eu/overview.php?v=CO2andGHG1970-2016&dst=GHGpc [Accessed 10.12.18]
2. World Resources Institute: https://www.wri.org/blog/2018/10/8-things-you-need-know-about-ipcc-15-c-report
[Accessed 10.12.18]
3. The IPCC’s Special Report on Global Warming of 1.5ºC, pub 6/10/18: : https://www.ipcc.ch/report/sr15/
[Accessed 10.12.18]
4. Cross-party support for Bristol Climate Emergency measure: https://www.bristol247.com/news-and-features/news/bristol-declares-climate-emergency-and-pledges-to-become-carbon-neutral-by-2030/
[Accessed 10.12.18]
5. Green Party Bristol. (2018) Greens declare a Climate Emergency and bring Bristol’s CO2 emissions target forwards 20 years. Available at: https://bristolgreenparty.org.uk/news/greens-declare-a-climate-emergency-and-bring-bristols-co2-emissions-target-forwards-20-years [Accessed 10.12.18]
Therefore we petition B&NES council to resolve to:
1. Declare a ‘Climate Emergency’;
2. Pledge to make Bath and North East Somerset carbon neutral by 2030, taking into account both production and consumption emissions (scope 1, 2 and 3) Scope 1, 2 and 3 of the Greenhouse Gas Protocol explained:
https://www.carbontrust.com/resources/faqs/services/scope-3-indirect-carbon-emissions [Accessed 10.12.18]
3. Call on Westminster to provide the powers and resources to make the 2030 target possible;
4. Work with other governments (both within the UK and internationally) to determine and implement best practice
methods to limit Global Warming to less than 1.5°C;
5. Continue to work with partners across the city and region to deliver this new goal through all relevant strategies and plans;
6. Report to Full Council within six months with the actions the Council will take to address this emergency.
I’m all for this. We need to take this action. But I would also like to understand what we are actually pledging here? Where can I find more information on what we are including within the scope of this? Are we talking about the Council being carbon neutral or does it include all residents and businesses? This would mean removing gas heating and cooking from all buildings, generating all energy from renewable energy and all vehicles being electric. What should be included in scope 3? Are we including the embedded carbon in all products purchased in the area (including the embedded carbon within all the new electric vehicles and solar panels we would be installing)? Presumably we would have to offset because we don’t have a global food system for example that is yet carbon neutral. Or any other system for that matter.
Zero carbon is an excellent idea but a real challenge for politicians. If you [Uk, Bath, you] want to be carbon neutral then you signing up fora massive transfer of wealth from those who have hi living standards [UK] to those who do not [eg India, China, Liberia etc]. Per capita income in UK $12.3k, China $1.7k Liberia $117 . How much of a sacrifice will you be prepared to make – 10% of your income, annually? One issue is to get buy in from the
majority of UK citizens for this programme and the sacrifices they will be taking – even if other countries do nothing. Clearly one part of the cost would be to invent and pay for the technology needed to de carbon the world economies, but this has benefits for [say] the UK economy. Its a worthwhile challenge, but I am not hopeful.