Monbiot's Heat manifesto brooks little argument

It was the radical essayist William Hazlitt who once observed that "if they cannot find a flaw in your reasoning, they will certainly find one in your reputation".

It is a sentiment the writer and environmentalist George Monbiot will be all too familiar with; it is to his immense credit that much of the criticism he attracts is entirely personal in nature.

It must be pretty galling to be constantly described by your columnist peers as a joyless, hectoring nag, particularly when Monbiot's weekly Guardian columns regularly display a refined sense of humour, albeit of the gallows variety. Monbiot can comfort himself, however, with the fact that his critics only target his style of delivery because it is so difficult to take issue with the content of his work.

Throughout his many articles and books, Monbiot always exemplifies the first rule of environmental campaigning: know your facts. Painfully aware that climate change deniers will seize on the slightest inaccuracy and, like the hairline fracture that leads to the dam's collapse, exploit it to destroy an entire argument, every point Monbiot makes is backed by years of painstaking research, every scientific paper mentioned is peer-reviewed, every expert is interviewed and every source is accurately referenced, sometimes to such an extent that the footnotes become more lengthy than the original article.

The message this level of research and referencing sends out to Monbiot's opponents is simple: you can try and disagree with his belief that climate change represents the greatest threat to humanity's future, but you better come armed with some pretty compelling evidence.

This sense of scientific authority is much in evidence throughout Monbiot's latest book, Heat: How to stop the Planet Burning, and serves to create the impression that there is genuinely little alternative to the course of action Monbiot advocates.

In particular, it makes for a stirring opening as he gleefully eviscerates the arguments of the climate change deniers, wading through countless scientific papers and following numerous obscure leads to reveal how the "denial industry” is largely based on discredited research, PR strategies adopted from the campaign to deny the health risks posed by cigarretes, and funding from the oil industry. He exposes the self-styled sceptics for what they really are, not searchers for truth as they claim but "members of the public relations industry, which begins with a conclusion and then devises arguments to support it".

The premise of Heat is simple, it takes on the most vexed question asked of climate change campaigners - "well, what do you propose instead?" - and tries to find a tenable answer. It almost succeeds.

Monbiot takes as his starting point recent scientific research that argues that to avoid the unstoppable global warming that will result when carbon sinks begin to collapse, the developed world will have to cut its carbon emmissions by 90 per cent by 2030 (in contrast, current government targets are 60 per cent by 2050) and sets out to explore how the UK could hit this target.

Things do not get off to an encouraging start. Monbiot recalls a lecture he gave in May 2005 in which he argued that an 80 per cent cut in greenhouse gas emissions was required in order to stop runaway climate change (further research prompted Monbiot to revise his reduction target to 90 per cent and since the book was published he has revised it upwards again in the wake of still more catastrophic reports on the accelerating pace of climate change). A member of the audience asked, "When you get your 80 per cent cut, what will this country look like?" Admitting he had never considered the implications, Monbiot invited a member of the audience, the veteran environmental campaigner Mayer Hillman, to answer for him.

"A very poor third-world country," Hillman responded.

From this unpromising beginning, Monbiot fastidiously explores the technologies, legislation and processes that could deliver a low-carbon economy within 30 years and finds that contrary to Hillman's pessimistic assessment, it is possible to create a low-carbon economy that is not characterised by crippling poverty.

Through a system of carbon rationing and trading built around the principles of contraction and convergence - a model for cutting greenhouse gas emissions that will see each country cap its emissions at the same per capita level - Monbiot argues it is possible to put a price on carbon emissions that will create the financial stimulus for transitioning to a low-carbon economy.

From here it is simply a matter of finding the right technologies and policies to deliver reduced carbon emissions while continuing to improve living standards. From Passivhaus buildings that don't need any heating to offshore wind farms that exploit new long-distance DC cables, from localised combined heat and power stations to a new coach-based transport system, from a return to seasonal food to the widespread adoption of online shopping, Monbiot tends to find them.

Unfortunately, the question for political and business leaders is not so much whether or not adoption of Monbiot's manifesto is essential to the future of humanity, but how politically and economically tenable his recommendations are. Does Monbiot succeed in his stated aim of making "the necessary changes as painless as possible"? The answer is pretty mixed.

Undoubtedly, many of Monbiot's recommendations and observations provide invaluable guidance and tips for business execs and politicians. His analysis of "our leaky homes", which "keep us warm almost incidentally, as the heat pours past us into the street", compared with the highly insulated, hugely efficient Passivhaus alternatives should be required reading for anyone who ever has to commission a refurbishment or new building. It really makes you wonder why, with such massive long-term cost savings being delivered by the energy efficient Passivhaus construction techniques, all new buildings are not already being built this way.

Meanwhile, his exploration of the Khazzoom-Brookes postulate, which explains how improvements in energy efficiency that are unaccompanied by tough legislation only ensure that financial savings are re-invested in more energy consumption, provides one of the most compelling arguments I have ever read for strong regulation that benefits society, the economy and the environment.

Equally, his lengthy advocacy of a major overhaul of the UK's energy grid provides countless examples of how a transition to a smarter grid based on massively increased levels of renewable energy generation would generate both efficiencies and vastly improved energy security.

However, as the book wears on, Monbiot's recommendations, while still being all but impossible to contest on scientific grounds, become increasingly leftfield, and therefore increasingly difficult for business and political leaders to countenance.

His proposals for a national network of coach lanes and out of town coach stations, for example, may represent the most carbon-efficient form of mass transit available, but as long as the car lobby remains so powerful they have no chance of being adopted. Equally, his vision of "virtual shopping", where supermarkets are replaced with distribution centres responding to online orders, may be highly efficient but would also prove extremely unpopular to a nation that counts browsing round the shop as its premier leisure activity.

Most frightening, on the grounds that it is the recommendation that is both the most urgent and the most unlikely to be attained, is Monbiot's assertion that we must pretty much stop flying.

There are no viable low-carbon alternatives to air travel, except perhaps airships, he argues, and therefore we must slash the number of flights by over 96 percent by 2030 to keep carbon emissions at safe levels. Monbiot admits, "I have sought the means of proving otherwise, not least because it would make my task of persuading people to adopt the proposals in this book much easier. But it has become plain to me that long-distance travel, high speed and the curtailment of climate change are not compatible. If you fly, you destroy other people's lives."

Such recommendations are so far from the political and business mainstream it is hard to imagine them being adopted in 50 years, let alone 20, but, as Monbiot constantly reminds us, the threats posed by climate change are so serious the alternatives could prove even more unthinkable.

Like I say, you can try and disagree with Monbiot's manifesto but it sure isn't easy.