Cambridge physicist tapped for Miliband's new climate advisor role

David Mackay, Cambridge academic and author of a best-selling book on the development of low-carbon energy, has reportedly been recruited by Ed Miliband to take on a new role as the government's chief scientific advisor on climate change.

According to reports in The Sunday Times, the professor at the Cavendish Library has been signed up by the energy and climate change secretary to advise on the government's climate change strategy and its high-profile, low-carbon transition plan.

Mackay has become a somewhat unlikely best-selling author this year, through his book Sustainable Energy - Without the Hot Air.

The academic tome on how to develop a low-carbon energy infrastructure is freely available online and has been widely praised by critics, hailed by the Economist as "a tour de force" and described by Science Magazine as "a cold blast of reality" for climate change policymakers.

Mackay has described the book as an attempt to deliver a "pro-arithmetic" assessment of various low-carbon policies that reveals the true scale of the new renewable energy sources that will be required and highlights the ineffectiveness of some current efforts to curb energy use.

For example, the book somewhat controversially notes that eco-gestures, such as saving energy by turning off phone chargers, save only miniscule amounts of energy. Mackay told The Guardian earlier this year that the amount of energy saved by switching off the phone charger is exactly the same as the energy used driving an average car for one second.

To date Mackay has been reluctant to enter the policy debate surrounding different forms of low-carbon energy, but he has repeatedly pointed out that large-scale new developments, such as a huge increase in nuclear or wind power and the development of Saharan solar farms, will be required to decarbonise the economy while maintaining European lifestyles.