Government urged to bolster carbon targets and green stimulus package

The government's proposed carbon targets are based on a "highly optimistic" assessment of global carbon emissions and are too weak to prevent dangerous levels of climate change, according to a new study from the Tyndall Centre for Climate Change.

According to Guardian reports, the research warns that the official advice set out by the government's independent Committee on Climate Change (CCC) late last year is "naively optimistic" and based on "unclear assumptions" about the growth rate for global emissions.

The CCC report said that under the UK's proposed carbon budgets the government should aim to cut emissions by between 34 and 42 per cent on 1990 levels by 2020 if it is to make an equitable contribution to global efforts to limit warming to two degrees above pre-industrial levels.

However, the Tyndall researchers said the CCC's analysis is based on the assumption that global emissions will peak in 2016, despite the fact that climate scientists gathering in Copenhagen last week confirmed that emissions have been growing faster than expected in recent years and there is little evidence that such an early peak is now viable.

The Tyndall Centre said a global peak in emissions by 2020 was more realistic, meaning that the UK government should as a minimum aim for the most stringent target set out by the CCC of a 42 per cent cut in emissions by 2020.

The CCC recommended that up to a fifth of this higher target could be met by importing carbon offset credits, but the Tyndall report said that it should be met entirely through domestic emission cuts without recourse to buying in carbon offset credits.

"The CCC's first report is… inevitably and significantly compromised by its implicit need to deliver demanding, but nonetheless politically palatable conclusions in line with the 2C threshold," the report said. "Peaking in 2020 would recast the agenda as much more radical and urgent, and well beyond the ability, even if applied stringently, of orthodox policies to deliver the necessary mitigation and adaptation."

The report, which was commissioned by Friends of the Earth, will be presented to the Environmental Audit Committee (EAC) of MPs later today.

It comes just a day after the EAC released a report that criticised the Treasury for not incorporating sufficient green measures in its most recent stimulus package.

The Committee said the £535m package set out in the Pre-Budget Report last November had not focused sufficiently on developing low carbon infrastructure.

It also called on the government to provide clearer information on how it plans to use its overall £3bn package of fiscal stimulus measures to cut carbon emissions, arguing more details were required about the "green strings" attached to loans to car firms, plans to accelerate improvements in building energy efficiency, and initiatives to provide financing to low carbon projects.

Tim Yeo MP, Chairman of the Committee, said that the Treasury had so far " announced very little new money for green investments", adding that the the upcoming Budget was now "a real test of the Government’s commitment to its own climate change policies".

"There is clear evidence that investment in low carbon industries will lead to net job creation," he added. "The Budget should contain a much bigger and more coherent package of green fiscal stimulus."