Carbon Footprint Barometer

Transcription

1 Carbon Footprint Barometer Compelling scientific evidence on the environmental impacts of human activity (particularly the milestone assessment of the IPCC in 2007) has raised global awareness on the threats of climate change and has triggered intense target-setting among governments at all levels. The UK is setting ambitious sustainable development goals, particularly regarding the reduction of greenhouse gas emissions. Local authorities, through their renewed planning and economic development duties, have the potential to play a significant role in bringing these goals forward. The latest data on the per capita carbon footprints of Great Britain s local communities, however, show a highly uneven contribution among districts residents towards the country s environmental impact, with the southern part of the country appearing to place higher strains on the environment, in the UK and beyond. Under the Kyoto Protocol, the UK is committed to reducing its greenhouse gas emissions by 12.5% against 1990 levels in the period The government is setting more long-term targets in its Climate Change Bill, which, if passed in its current form, will make the UK unique in introducing legally binding goals on emissions reductions (a 60 per cent reduction against 1990 levels by 2050). This target is likely to increase to 80 per cent, as suggested by the UK's independent climate change committee. At the local level, authorities are required to prepare a Sustainable Community Strategy, setting out how the council will address economic, social and environmental issues in their area. Moreover, the proposed Comprehensive Area Assessments include indicators for carbon emissions reductions, air quality and biodiversity that can be set as targets in the Local Area Agreements. In addition, more than 270 local authorities have signed the Nottingham Declaration, a voluntary commitment to take the necessary steps for climate change mitigation in their services and communities. Rank Top 10: Carbon footprint per capita (tonnes of CO 2 ), London City South Buckinghamshire Mole Valley Chiltern Elmbridge Waverley Richmond-upon-Thames Macclesfield South Oxfordshire Surrey Heath Rank Bottom 10: Carbon footprint per capita (tonnes of CO 2 ), Sunderland Birmingham South Tyneside Blaenau Gwent Middlesbrough Easington Barking and Dagenham Sandwell Tower Hamlets Newham Source: Local Knowledge; SEI Experimental results, October 2008 In this context, it is a good time to take a closer look at the snapshot of districts carbon footprints, informed by the latest experimental data released from the Stockholm Environment Institute (SEI) 1. The SEI s per capita carbon footprint indicator measures carbon dioxide emissions at the district level, 1 It should be noted that the carbon footprint indicator developed by SEI is not a performance indicator and should be distinguished from the national indicator 186 which is issued by Defra and measures the carbon emissions of local authority areas. 1

2 associated with aspects of residents lifestyle as a whole: emissions caused by domestic energy use, transport, housing, consumption of food and other goods that households buy and use (including emissions incorporated in imported goods) 2. According to this indicator, some of the wealthiest localities in England dominate the list of top ten districts with the highest carbon footprint per capita. The City of London, Richmond upon Thames, South Buckinghamshire and Surrey districts feature at the top of the ranking. The geography of per capita carbon footprint at the district level reveals strong patterns, which mark the intense strain placed on the national and global environment by some of Great Britain s communities. The map below shows a clear divide between the North and South of the country in terms of carbon-intensive activities and lifestyles, matching - to some degree - patterns of affluence. Aside from large parts of London and the South East, areas of high carbon stress lie primarily in parts of the Southwest (mainly Wiltshire, Gloucestershire and Dorset) and parts of Norfolk, Hertfordshire, Cambridgeshire and Essex in the East of England. Areas with high carbon footprints are also found in an arc starting from Cumbria and moving into North Yorkshire up to Harrogate. The best-performing areas on the other hand, are largely concentrated in Wales and the Northeast and parts of the Northwest. Scotland also performs relatively well excluding Aberdeen City 3. An interesting pattern arising from the data is that some London boroughs and other urban hubs of the country, such as Tower Hamlets, Newham and Birmingham, are among the areas with the lowest personal carbon footprints in the country. This could be related to efficiencies in transport and housing resulting from high urban density and from lower car usage 4. This local variation in environmental impact is an indication of the magnitude of the effort needed by some localities in order for them to contribute to a more sustainable future. As the government s watchdog on sustainable development 2 The indicator however excludes emissions incorporated in goods not used domestically but exported for use abroad. For detailed explanations of the indicator and how it is computed and for online local authority profiles of carbon and overall ecological footprint, see 3 Note also that the high per capita footprint for the Highland is most likely skewed by its very low population density. 4 WWF-UK (2006), Ecological budget UK: Counting Consumption 2

3 has pointed out 5, the policy mechanisms proposed or already set to deal with climate change match neither the magnitude of the problem nor the goals that the government has set itself. This is also true for action at the local level, which is fundamental for climate change mitigation. The Sustainable Development Commission is to incorporate carbon emissions and other environmental impact indicators in the performance criteria it sets for local authorities. However, if this performance framework is to meaningfully inform the formulation of local strategies and actions, a more comprehensive evidence base is necessary. In addition to that - and most importantly - clear responsibilities and powers to curb carbon emissions need to be devolved to local authorities. More specific mechanisms, funding and incentives need to be put in place in order for local authorities to improve the carbon performance of transport and housing - new and existing -, to stimulate green entrepreneurship and to work with local communities in order to encourage more sustainable consumption patterns. Failure to do so can seriously undermine the already extremely difficult task of delivering the government s carbon emissions targets. 5 Sustainable Development Commission (2007), Submission to the Joint Committee on the Draft Climate Change Bill 3

4 Case Study: Carbon Footprint by categories The carbon footprint indicator can be broken down into constituent categories that serve as separate indicators (transport, housing, food, consumer goods, public and private services and capital investment). These can help assess the environmental impacts of different aspects of communities activities and to identify more targeted policies and action on the ground. Housing carbon footprint accounts for the greatest share in the average per capita carbon footprint of local authorities, closely followed by that associated with transport. The two are responsible for more 44 per cent of the average district s per capita footprint. GB Average Carbon footprint by category (tonnes) TOTAL Housing Transport Public Services Consumer Items Food Private Services Capital investment Other Looking at the district rankings within Great Britain for some of the constituent categories, one can discern the effect of the density of development and of the socioeconomic conditions of local authorities on residents carbon footprints. Indeed, residents of densely urbanised districts with developed transport systems (such as Newham, Barking and Dagenham, Slough - with the exception of the City of London that tops the rankings in almost all categories) have the lowest housing and transport footprints in Great Britain. This reflects the fact that in city centres there are shorter travel times and greater use of public transport, added to the dominance of flats (more energy efficient) rather than large houses (less efficient) that are found in suburbs and rural areas. Conversely, we find residents in wealthy boroughs of London and districts of the Southeast having the largest footprints associated with food consumption and with use of other consumer products. This reflects the burden that the South s unsustainable patterns of material consumption place on the country s environment and the planet as a whole. 4

5 Rank Top 10: Carbon Footprint per capita (tonnes of CO 2 ) Housing, Dundee City South Buckinghamshire Cotswold Torfaen Chiltern Shetland Islands Macclesfield Mole Valley Western Isles South Oxfordshire 4.34 Bottom 10: Carbon Footprint per Rank capita (tonnes of CO 2 ) Housing, Plymouth Barking and Dagenham Slough Oxford Exeter Cambridge Vale of Glamorgan Camden Newham Tower Hamlets 2.90 Source: Local Knowledge; SEI Experimental results, October 2008 Top 10: Carbon Footprint per Rank capita ( tonnes of CO 2 ) - Transport, London city St Albans Uttlesford South Cambridgeshire East Hertfordshire Elmbridge Mole Valley Brentwood Surrey Heath South Buckinghamshire 3.85 Bottom 10: Carbon Footprint per Rank capita (tonnes of CO 2 ) Transport, Hartlepool Gateshead Middlesbrough Merthyr Tydfil Sunderland South Tyneside Blaenau Gwent Easington Barking and Dagenham Newham 2.17 Source: Local Knowledge; SEI Experimental results, October 2008 Top 10: Carbon Footprint per capita Rank (tonnes of CO 2 ) Consumer Items, London city Kensington and Chelsea Westminster, City of Richmond-upon-Thames Mole Valley Elmbridge South Buckinghamshire Chiltern Waverley Surrey Heath 1.65 Bottom 10: Carbon Footprint per Rank capita (tonnes of CO 2 ) Consumer Items, South Tyneside Merthyr Tydfil Walsall Wolverhampton Leicester City Blaenau Gwent Birmingham Newham Easington Sandwell 1.11 Source: Local Knowledge; SEI Experimental results, October 2008 Top 10: Carbon Footprint per Rank capita (tonnes of CO 2 ) - Food, London city Kensington and Chelsea Richmond-upon-Thames Westminster, City of Wandsworth Kingston-upon-Thames Macclesfield Hammersmith and Fulham Camden Bromley 1.43 Bottom 10: Carbon Footprint per Rank capita (tonnes of CO 2 ) - Food, Newham Leicester City Stoke on Trent Walsall Wolverhampton Slough Merthyr Tydfil Birmingham Blaenau Gwent Sandwell 0.95 Source: Local Knowledge, SEI Experimental results, October

6 Case study: Birmingham versus Lichfield A comparison between Birmingham and Lichfield can show how a combination of socioeconomic factors and urban form, together with targeted local strategies, can lead to great differences in the per capita carbon footprint of neighbouring districts. Birmingham s Sustainable Community Strategy has an increased focus on policies regarding sustainable transport, climate change adaptation and corporate social responsibility. The Council s LSP has launched a Birmingham Cutting CO2 campaign and has adopted sustainable procurement policies. Birmingham s compact urban development already favours the use of public transport and other sustainable ways of travel rather than car usage. It also results in a small average household size. Therefore, the city s residents record smaller than average carbon footprints associated with their housing and transport. At the same time, Birmingham is facing important socioeconomic challenges, suffering from aboveaverage levels of fuel poverty and scoring high on the index of multiple deprivation. Low levels of affluence result in low levels of consumption, leading to Birmingham s low ranking in terms of per capita footprint associated with consumption of food and other material products. In fact, the district is ranked 406 th and 405 th among the 408 districts in Great Britain in these two carbon footprint subcategories respectively. By contrast, neighbouring Lichfield enjoys higher levels of affluence and much lower levels of deprivation than Birmingham. This translates to larger homes and higher rates of car ownership, with the latter also stemming from less developed transport links. Lichfield records a higher per capita carbon footprint than Birmingham in all subcategories and a 20 per cent higher total per capita carbon footprint. Carbon Footprint (tonnes CO2) per capita by category Consumer CF pc Food CF pc Transport CF pc Housing CF pc Birmingham Lichfield GB average 6

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13 Local Authority Total Carbon Footprint per capita (tonnes of CO2), 2004 Housing Carbon Footprint per capita (tonnes of CO2), 2004 Transport Carbon Footprint per capita (tonnes of CO2), 2004 Food Carbon Footprint per capita (tonnes of CO2), 2004 Consumer Items Carbon Footprint per capita (tonnes of CO2), 2004 Private Services Carbon Footprint per capita (tonnes of CO2), 2004 Public Services Carbon Footprint per capita (tonnes of CO2), 2004 Capital investment Carbon Footprint per capita (tonnes of CO2), 2004 Other Rank (by total Carbon Footprint) Aberdeen City Aberdeenshire Adur Allerdale Alnwick Amber Valley Angus Argyll and Bute Arun Ashfield Ashford Aylesbury Vale Babergh Barking and Dagenham Barnet Barnsley Barrow-in-Furness Basildon Basingstoke and Deane Bassetlaw Bath and North East Somerset Bedford Berwick-upon-Tweed Bexley Birmingham Blaby Blackburn Blackpool Blaenau Gwent

14 Blyth Valley Bolsover Bolton Boston Bournemouth Bracknell Forest Bradford Braintree Breckland Brent Brentwood Bridgend Bridgnorth Brighton and Hove Bristol Broadland Bromley Bromsgrove Broxbourne Broxtowe Burnley Bury Caerphilly Calderdale Cambridge Camden Cannock Chase Canterbury Caradon Cardiff Carlisle Carmarthenshire Carrick Castle Morpeth Castle Point Ceredigion

15 Charnwood Chelmsford Cheltenham Cherwell Chester Chesterfield Chester-le-Street Chichester Chiltern Chorley Christchurch Clackmannanshire Colchester Congleton Conwy Copeland Corby Cotswold Coventry Craven Crawley Crewe and Nantwich Croydon Dacorum Darlington Dartford Daventry Denbighshire Derby City Derbyshire Dales Derwentside Doncaster Dover Dudley Dumfries and Galloway Dundee City

16 Durham Ealing Easington East Ayrshire East Cambridgeshire East Devon East Dorset East Dunbartonshire East Hampshire East Hertfordshire East Lindsey East Lothian East Northamptonshire East Renfrewshire East Riding of Yorkshire East Staffordshire Eastbourne Eastleigh Eden Edinburgh, City of Ellesmere Port and Neston Elmbridge Enfield Epping Forest Epsom and Ewell Erewash Exeter Falkirk Fareham Fenland Fife Flintshire Forest Heath Forest of Dean Fylde Gateshead

17 Gedling Glasgow City Gloucester Gosport Gravesham Great Yarmouth Greenwich Guildford Gwynedd Hackney Halton Hambleton Hammersmith and Fulham Harborough Haringey Harlow Harrogate Harrow Hart Hartlepool Hastings Havant Havering Herefordshire, County of Hertsmere High Peak Highland Hillingdon Hinckley and Bosworth Horsham Hounslow Huntingdonshire Hyndburn Inverclyde Ipswich Isle of Anglesey

18 Isle of Wight Isles of Scilly Islington Kennet Kensington and Chelsea Kerrier Kettering King's Lynn and West Norfolk Kingston upon Hull Kingston-upon-Thames Kirklees Knowsley Lambeth Lancaster Leeds Leicester City Lewes Lewisham Lichfield Lincoln Liverpool London city Luton Macclesfield Maidstone Maldon Malvern Hills Manchester Mansfield Medway Towns Melton Mendip Merthyr Tydfil Merton Mid Bedfordshire Mid Devon

19 Mid Suffolk Mid Sussex Middlesbrough Midlothian Milton Keynes Mole Valley Monmouthshire Moray Neath Port Talbot New Forest Newark and Sherwood Newcastle-under-Lyme Newcastle-upon-Tyne Newham Newport North Ayrshire North Cornwall North Devon North Dorset North East Derbyshire North East Lincolnshire North Hertfordshire North Kesteven North Lanarkshire North Lincolnshire North Norfolk North Shropshire North Somerset North Tyneside North Warwickshire North West Leicestershire North Wiltshire Northampton Norwich Nottingham Nuneaton and Bedworth

20 Oadby and Wigston Oldham Orkney Islands Oswestry Oxford Pembrokeshire Pendle Penwith Perthshire and Kinross Peterborough Plymouth Poole Portsmouth Powys Preston Purbeck Reading Redbridge Redcar and Cleveland Redditch Reigate and Banstead Renfrewshire Restormel Rhondda, Cynon, Taff Ribble Valley Richmondshire Richmond-upon-Thames Rochdale Rochford Rossendale Rother Rotherham Rugby Runnymede Rushcliffe Rushmoor

21 Rutland Ryedale Salford Salisbury Sandwell Scarborough Scottish Borders Sedgefield Sedgemoor Sefton Selby Sevenoaks Sheffield Shepway Shetland Islands Shrewsbury and Atcham Slough Solihull South Ayrshire South Bedfordshire South Buckinghamshire South Cambridgeshire South Derbyshire South Gloucestershire South Hams South Holland South Kesteven South Lakeland South Lanarkshire South Norfolk South Northamptonshire South Oxfordshire South Ribble South Shropshire South Somerset South Staffordshire

22 South Tyneside Southampton Southend-on-Sea Southwark Spelthorne St Albans St Edmundsbury St Helens Stafford Staffordshire Moorlands Stevenage Stirling Stockport Stockton on Tees Stoke on Trent Stratford-on-Avon Stroud Suffolk Coastal Sunderland Surrey Heath Sutton Swale Swansea Swindon Tameside Tamworth Tandridge Taunton Deane Teesdale Teignbridge Telford and Wrekin Tendring Test Valley Tewkesbury Thanet Three Rivers

23 Thurrock Tonbridge and Malling Torbay Torfaen Torridge Tower Hamlets Trafford Tunbridge Wells Tynedale Uttlesford Vale of Glamorgan Vale of White Horse Vale Royal Wakefield Walsall Waltham Forest Wandsworth Wansbeck Warrington Warwick Watford Waveney Waverley Wealden Wear Valley Wellingborough Welwyn Hatfield West Berkshire West Devon West Dorset West Dunbartonshire West Lancashire West Lindsey West Lothian West Oxfordshire West Somerset

24 West Wiltshire Western Isles Westminster, City of Weymouth and Portland Wigan Winchester Windsor and Maidenhead Wirral Woking Wokingham Wolverhampton Worcester Worthing Wrexham Wychavon Wycombe Wyre Wyre Forest York Disclaimer: Footprint data published by SEI on 15th October As with all data sets this information is subject to continuous analysis and methodological improvements. Any future changes are highly unlikely to significantly affect overall results or rankings 1