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• Many local authorities are preparing climate actions plans. • Policies to increase distributed energy generation such as PV are likely. • As capacities increase, PV can dominate system variability and predictability. • Predictive demand side response (DSR) may be too coarse to address this. • More granular techniques such as using system frequency may be required. Since 2018, over three quarters of UK local governments have signed climate emergency declarations signalling a new phase in local climate action. Many areas are developing climate action plans and considering what policies could be adopted to increase the use of distributed energy resources, such as building-integrated photo-voltaic (PV) generation. In this paper we demonstrate how city-scale backcasting can be used as a tool to go beyond technical feasibility and explore the policy, market and governance implications of decarbonisation pathways across the local and nation scales. Using urban PV as an example we model three scenarios for increasing installed capacity in the UK city of Bristol and demonstrate how, in each case, PV switches from being a minor 'negative load' on the energy system to being the dominant factor determining the volatility and predictability of the energy demand during daylight hours. Current approaches to integrating distributed energy resources into the wider system tend to focus on predictive modelling and half-hourly pricing to drive demand-side response. Our analysis indicates the risks of relying on these non-real time methods and suggests that more granular techniques such as triggering local DSR based on changes in electricity system frequency could better manage the variability of high levels of PV deployment at the local scale. We also demonstrate the importance of developing new local approaches to system integration that bring together network operators, local authorities and other local actors to deploy renewable generation and flexibility assets in coordination. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

How we frame environmental problems and their solutions matters. Under the UK Net Zero Strategy and the European Green Deal, climate action—as a policy- and regulatory response to climate change—is framed overwhelmingly positive and coupled with the ambitions to generate growth, facilitate innovation, improve health and wellbeing, ensure inclusiveness and much else. This is done to project climate ambitions as part of a win–win scenario where no one is left behind. Yet it is unclear how each of the different aims relate to each other, which risks creating legal dilemmas, and possibly undermining climate action altogether. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In the face of a changing climate, a growing number of construction firms are adopting carbon reduction targets on individual projects and across their portfolios. In the wake of the Paris Agreement, some firms are seeking a means of aligning their targets with sectoral, national and international mitigation commitments. There are numerous ways by which such an alignment can be achieved, each requiring different assumptions. Using data from the UK construction industry, this paper reviews current company commitments and progress in carbon mitigation; analyses the unique challenges in aligning construction targets, and presents a series of possible sectoral decarbonisation trajectories. The results highlight the disparity between current company targets and the range of possible trajectories. It is clear that a cross-industry dialogue is urgently required to establish an appropriate response that delivers both a widely-accepted target trajectory and a plan for its delivery. This paper is intended to stimulate and support this necessary debate by illustrating the impact of different methodological assumptions and highlighting the critical features of an appropriate response. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

To determine whether innovations in policy concerning climate-change mitigation are symbolic or truly radical in the sense of ‘tipping’ existing policy portfolios towards a new instrumental logic, we study policy innovations in the context of pre-existing policy portfolios and analyse the associated dynamics over time. Our analysis is facilitated by a new measurement of policy output, the Index of Climate Policy Activity. This new approach sheds light on the relative importance of policy innovations in complex policy portfolios, and serves as a blueprint for further analyses of the politics of policy innovation. Empirically, we analyse policy innovations within the policy portfolios of energy production in Austria, Germany, and the UK between 1998 and 2010. We find high stability in the instrumental logic but substantial change in policy settings and calibrations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Making a low carbon economic future for the UK has been declared a key priority by both the previous Labour government and also the current coalition government. Yet there is a large gap between the symbolic representations of a low carbon future and their material manifestations in low carbon technologies and infrastructure in particular places. This paper addresses this gap through focusing on the organisation of urban low carbon transition activity. There is often significant capacity to act in reconfiguring urban energy systems that remains latent due to a missing organisational context for its co-ordination according to a mutually defined rationale or vision. This paper develops a conceptual framework to demonstrate and understand different modes of urban energy intermediation. Examples are used of intermediary organisation in London and Manchester to understand the strengths and partiality of each mode of intermediation and the necessity to integrate these different aspects of urban intermediary governance. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

This paper engages with the progressive politics of climate change and resource constraint developed by the Transition ‘movement’ which looks to develop a positive local politics of the transition to a low carbon economy and society. At the heart of this politics is a vision of economic localisation rooted in a geographical imaginary of market towns with agricultural hinterlands. Consequently, the question of how the Transition model can be applied in urban settings has not been clear, leading to the implicit assumption that urban Transition initiatives are more complex and difficult. In contrast, this paper argues that the plasticity of Transition politics means that, in some cases, an urban context might be more productive for the development of Transition initiatives because it allows for a greater diversity of political action as well as providing a density of networks and resources that can be critical for the survival of grassroots interventions. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

The article discusses an innovative policy approach to climate change mitigation in Great Britain, called personal carbon trading (PCT), in which emission rights are allocated to individuals. According to the authors, despite the many variations of the PCT scheme, there are two main components they all share, including the lack of an option to opt out once an individual becomes part of a scheme and the distribution of an annual, equal per capita carbon emissions allowance for personal use without a fee. Topic include a discussion of the rationale behind a cap-and-trade policy approach in the context of climate mitigation policies, a summary of the status of PCT policy and research in Great Britain, and implications of the personal carbon allowances (PCA) scheme on individuals.