Search

Decarbonization policies require public support to be implemented and to remain in legislation. Examinations of public support for climate policies tend to focus on a small number of policy instruments and/or use hypothetical instead of real policy proposals. Here, we address these criticisms by examining public support across four distinct policy instruments – command-and-control, market-based, information-based, and voluntary – using sixteen policy proposals by UK political parties and government institutions. In addition to assessing UK national policy support, we also explore regional differences. Using a representative sample of the UK population (N = 1,911), we find that, at a national level, individuals preferred instruments shown to be less effective in reaching net-zero: information-based and voluntary policies. Our results indicate that the extent to which individuals believe in the free market, their environmental worldviews and political party support as well as their age are all correlated with policy support. We find stark regional differences where, compared to individuals living in Greater London, those living in the remainder of the country were 32% and 30% less likely to support command-and-control and market-based policies, respectively (among other regional differences). Regional variations in free-market beliefs and population density partly explain differences in policy support. We propose policymakers focus on place-based initiatives to increase support for decarbonization policies that are more effective in reaching net-zero and on improving the perception of market-based and command-and-control policies through positive framing and policy bundles. The majority of the UK public supports all climate policy instruments (command-and-control, market-based, information-based, and voluntary) regardless of their stringency. More stringent decarbonization policies (command-and-control and market-based instruments) received less public support compared to more lenient policies (information-based and voluntary). Population density as a structural factor helps to explain regional variation and points to the crucial role of improving public infrastructure, particularly in more rural areas. Free-market beliefs are associated with regional and individual variations in support and stress the need for overcoming ideological barriers. Income was found to influence support for less stringent (e.g. information-based) instruments, but was not associated with support for regulatory and market-based instruments. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The UK government's net-zero commitment assumes the use of bio-energy with carbon capture and storage (BECCS) and direct air carbon capture and storage (DACCS). Quantifying where the costs of funding these technologies fall – and their magnitude – provides greater insight into potential fairness of future government policies. Using a microsimulation model, this study is the first to evaluate the potential distributional impacts. We consider the distributional incidence and magnitude on household income deciles if the costs for deploying and operating BECCS and DACCS are placed on different sectors of the economy via a range of viable policy funding options. Using existing and novel policy funding options, we demonstrate that levying the costs entirely on the household energy bill is the most regressive of the options considered. We find aviation to be an important point of intervention from a distributional perspective. Higher-income households have larger aviation carbon footprints than lower-income households, meaning passing costs onto households via aviation alone could help fund BECCS and DACCS while having minimal impacts on social welfare. Funding BECCS and DACCS via income tax emerged as the only progressive way of apportioning costs across income deciles. As the benefits of carbon removal accrue to society as a whole, there is further argument that the costs should be shared across society in the fairest way possible. However, such an approach has the potential to blunt the price signal that polluters face. In reality, some pass-through cost may be desirable to adhere to equity principles under a polluter pays principle and to create an incentive for polluters to switch to cleaner inputs and adopt low-carbon technologies. This study is the first to evaluate distributional incidence and magnitude of costs to households, if costs for deploying and operating BECCS and DACCS are placed on different sectors of the economy. Recovering policy costs via income tax provides a progressive option to fund BECCS and DACCS. All modelled alternative funding options result in regressive outcomes where low-income households pay disproportionately more towards the costs of BECCS and DACCS. Funding BECCS and DACCS through levies on household energy bills further entrenches inequality; spend on electricity as a share of income is disproportionately high for low-income households. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Sweden's 2017 Climate Act is part of a climate policy framework aiming for net zero domestic greenhouse gas emissions by 2045. The framework was based on a proposal from the All Party Committee on Environmental Objectives (the Committee), in which members from all participating parliamentary parties agreed unanimously. This was despite a contested climate debate running in parallel, notwithstanding strong criticism from business confederations and trade unions. Aiming to draw lessons of value for climate policy-making, this study explores the main factors that influenced the work and outcomes of the Committee, based on a series of in-depth interviews and document review. The research design is linked to policy process theories. The interviews mainly concern underlying motives, the role of knowledge, the influence of impact assessments, and international influence. It is shown that a continuous and comprehensive learning process in the Committee was instrumental for achieving consensus, including addressing concerns among some members regarding policy costs and constitutionality. The Committee was also influenced by policy developments elsewhere, referred to as policy diffusion, notably from the U.K. Climate Change Act and the UNFCCC COP 21 policy process. Over time, a cross-party consensus among Committee members emerged and led to the invention of an original policy proposal. The consensus was instrumental for generating support for the proposal in an otherwise conflictual political landscape. As a result, a governmental bill based on the proposal was eventually enacted into law, renewing Sweden's climate policy with a climate change act coupled to ambitious climate objectives. Key policy insights Joint learning on factually complex and normatively contested climate issues requires time and comprehensive processes but can lead to policy inventions and ambitious outcomes. Policy diffusion between countries may be important for raising ambitions and shaping innovative, new elements of national climate policy. Framework climate change acts and specific climate laws can be mutually supportive, i.e. frameworks foster more ambitious sectoral laws and the more precise sectoral laws, the easier it is to agree on stricter overall ambitions. Adoption of more stringent climate policies may require precise dismantling of arguments working against action, in particular on policy costs. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A successful carbon capture and storage (CCS) policy and programme is widely considered essential to curbing carbon dioxide emissions. What explains the strikingly different policy outcomes in two key European Union political heavyweights and coal economies, the UK and Germany? The UK has decided to contract two specific CCS projects, with explicit timelines for realisation; Germany has made no such decisions. From scrutiny of official documents and in-depth high-level interviews, it was found that the UK has more favourable structural capacity, including offshore storage capacity (which evokes less conflict) and significant oil-industry expertise, and thus an easier task. Moreover, this structural capacity has interacted with a solid political commitment to bring CCS forward in the UK, including specific, multistage funding and a high-level drive to develop CCS, especially after 2009. In Germany, by contrast, CCS has encountered increasing local and central opposition since 2009, with the Energiewende and renewables being accorded priority. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper seeks to understand how the UK government's headline climate change targets are translated into action at the local level in the transport sector drawing on the findings of research in two English regions. In doing so, these headline targets are identified as a symbolic meta-policy that results in little action on the ground and which challenges established conceptions of policy implementation. Both the 'meta' and 'symbolic' aspects of the policy offer part of the explanation for the lack of substantive action on the ground. As a meta-policy, the headline targets across government require the elaboration of other policies at other levels such as targets for government departments and local authorities, but these are largely absent, leaving the meta-policy without teeth. Over time, these headline targets have developed into a symbolic policy, serving political goals but having little practical effectiveness. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The journalistic norm of ‘balanced’ reporting (giving roughly equal coverage to both sides in any significant dispute) is recognised as both useful and problematic in communicating emerging scientific consensus on human attribution for global climate change. Analysis of the practice of this norm in United States (US) and United Kingdom (UK) newspaper coverage of climate science between 2003 and 2006 shows a significant divergence from scientific consensus in the US in 2003–4, followed by a decline in 2005–6, but no major divergence in UK reporting. These findings inform ongoing considerations about the spatially-differentiated media terms and conditions through which current and future climate policy is negotiated and implemented. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The UK climate change programme has introduced a range of instruments to foster investment in low carbon technologies and markets. We estimate the total value of these interventions, in terms of the redirection of financial flows and directly foregone tax income, to be about £1.3 billion per year (c. Euro or US$ 2 billion per year), as from 2002 to 2003 when the renewable obligation certificates (ROCs) first take effect. About 20% of this consists of direct expenditure, the remaining 80% is in the form of indirect expenditures contained within sectors (ROCs, the energy efficiency commitments), and foregone tax revenues. Most of the energy-efficiency investment is estimated to recoup expenditure within normal life-cycles and may thus be considered profitable; the profitability of the supply-side interventions is predicated mostly upon expected cost reductions associated with the build up of the associated industries. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

The article discusses the decision made by the government of Great Britain to seek an 80% cut in greenhouse gas emissions by 2050. It states that Ed Milliband, Energy and Climate Change Secretary of Great Britain, has agreed to the 80% cuts from 1990 levels by 2050 as part of a global climate change policy. Great Britain had previously decided upon a 60% cut, but decided upon the more aggressive policy because reports indicate that global emissions have grown faster than originally expected.

Looks at Britain's Labour government's attempt to take the high ground in the climate change debate when it confirmed a pre-election promise to cut United Kingdom greenhouse-gas emissions to 80 percent of 1990 levels by 2010. The praise by John Prescott, secretary of state for superministry combining environment, transport and the regions, of his predecessor's attempts to raise the profile of environmental issues.