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News

Stern Review emphasis urgency of action on climate change

Wind can lead the way

Monday 30 October 2006

The British Wind Energy Association today warmly welcomed the Stern Review’s message that tackling climate change is vital for the health of the world economy.

In particular, BWEA strongly agrees with Sir Nicholas Stern’s conclusion that the cost of acting now is far smaller than the possible economic impact of ‘business as usual’.

“The move to a low-carbon economy is as much about opportunity as cost,” observed BWEA Chief Executive Maria McCaffery. “Renewable energy, and wind power in particular, can be a massive benefit to the prosperity of this country, providing secure, stably-priced energy supplies in the short term. In the future, UK companies could be generating significant export revenues in the emerging technologies of wave and tidal power. In order to achieve these results, however, the Government has to urgently show that the UK is a good place to do renewable business.”

Many analyses of the climate change problem, now including the Stern Review, have underlined the need to act now to reduce carbon emissions. Renewable energy is one of the few supply-side options that can make a major difference to emissions in the short term, but there continue to be obstacles to its rapid growth. Onshore wind in particular is hampered by long and expensive planning processes, and slow development of the grid infrastructure required to transport the power to the market. If these issues were dealt with firmly by Government now, the path would be clear to obtaining 6% of our power from wind by 2010, and with additional action on offshore wind, approaching 15% by 2015.

“With the best wind resource in Europe in addition to huge wave and tidal potential, the prospect is for the UK to be a world leader in this vital sector. Stern tells us we must act now to seize this economic opportunity while there is still time to avert dangerous climate change,” said McCaffery.

Notes to editors:

The British Wind Energy Association (BWEA) is the UK’s leading renewable energy association, with over 300 company members. Formed 28 years ago, BWEA is at the forefront of the development of the UK wind industry, representing the sector to Government, business, media and the public. It expanded its mission two years ago to champion the emerging technologies of wave and tidal stream power generation. Wind energy has now started a major expansion in the UK and will be the single greatest contributor to the Government’s 10% 2010 renewable energy target and 20% 2020 renewable aspiration. Together, wind, wave and tidal power can supply 21% of our electricity by 2020, resulting in over £16bn of investment in UK plc.

BWEA's full submission to the Energy Review, including all the research undertaken by the Association can be found at www.bwea.com/energyreview.

The Stern Review report on the Economics of Climate Change can be found on the Treasury website at www.hm-treasury.gov.uk/independent_reviews/stern_review_economics_climate_change/sternreview_index.cfm