Monday, 25 February 2019

DCC declares ‘climate emergency’ but rejects 2030 target

Time is running out to control greenhouse gas emissions and halt runaway climate change:
The world’s leading climate scientists have warned there is only a dozen years for global warming to be kept to a maximum of 1.5C, beyond which even half a degree will significantly worsen the risks of drought, floods, extreme heat and poverty for hundreds of millions of people.
The authors of the landmark report by the UN Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC)... say urgent and unprecedented changes are needed to reach the target, which they say is affordable and feasible although it lies at the most ambitious end of the Paris agreement pledge to keep temperatures between 1.5C and 2C.
The IPCC's Dr Debra Roberts warned:
It’s a line in the sand and what it says to our species is that this is the moment and we must act now. This is the largest clarion bell from the science community and I hope it mobilises people and dents the mood of complacency.
However, not everyone appreciates the urgency of our existential crisis. Last week, Devon County Council’s Full Council agreed to declare a "climate emergency" and to become carbon neutral by 2050 – but despite pleas from campaigners, Conservative councillors refused to back an amendment bringing this target forward to 2030, a target adopted by a number of other councils including Cornwall, where:
... a cross-party amendment was accepted which went even further than the original motion.
If we are to avoid the worst-case scenarios, then the social change required will be deep. Radical social change is uncomfortable and difficult – but I believe that as local representatives of our communities we have a responsibility to take leadership. Cornwall Council has shown that leadership today.
In Devon, it was a different story. Whilst various councillors spoke in favour of the 2030 amendment:
We need to recognise the issues with climate change and that we are heading towards extinction, and this is a call to action on the scale of a declaration of war. After 2030 it may be too late.
We have to act now as there is no Planet B. We have already caused irrecoverable climate change and we have to declare a climate emergency.
The crisis of climate change is the greatest threat facing mankind today, and we should have climate change impacts at the bottom of every report that comes before us.
This is an issue where there are really strict deadlines. Without the deadline, the cabinet motion simply isn’t that meaningful.
Cllr John Hart, Leader of the Council, on the other hand argued:
We are doing a lot on climate change and we are doing the right things, but we are being told that by 2030 we cannot make zero carbon. We have put together a recommendation that says what we can do and I can work with that.
I cannot work with an arbitrary figure that may or may not be possible and everyone professionally tells me that it cannot be done and we cannot be carbon neutral by 2030.





When it comes to minerals – and on that subject of "We are doing a lot on climate change" – DCC’s Minerals Plan does indeed recognise that:
One of the biggest challenges facing Devon’s communities and environment, together with the wider world, is climate change driven by global warming. 3.4.1
and is indeed proud to proclaim:
Mitigation of and adaptation to climate change is a key consideration and statutory duty for the Devon Minerals Plan, and will be a cross-cutting theme for the Strategy. 2.2.4
How might that be achieved? "Objective 1: Spatial Strategy" is clear:
Within geological constraints, secure a spatial pattern of mineral development that delivers the essential resources to markets within and outside Devon while minimising transportation by road and generation of greenhouse gases... 3.2
How might that relate to Straitgate Farm, a Preferred Area for sand and gravel extraction?
Maintaining the production of sand and gravel from the southern and northern parts of the Pebble Beds is also important in minimising transportation distances to the main markets in Devon and adjoining areas in accordance with Objective 1 and Policy M1. 5.4.8
Which is where everything becomes unstuck. Because by DCC continuing to entertain AI’s planning application for Straitgate – to dig up material from the southern part of the Pebble Beds only to be processed in the northern part of the Pebble Beds necessitating a 2.5 million mile haulage plan – it undoes any illusion of acting on climate change. The Minerals Plan was adopted in 2017. Straitgate will be the first application for a new greenfield quarry site in Devon to be determined against that Plan.

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