Britain's Climate Action Plan Unlawful, High Court Rules (theguardian.com) 25
The UK government's climate action plan is unlawful, the high court has ruled, as there is not enough evidence that there are sufficient policies in place to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. From a report: The energy secretary, Claire Coutinho, will now be expected to draw up a revised plan within 12 months. This must ensure that the UK achieves its legally binding carbon budgets and its pledge to cut emissions by more than two-thirds by 2030, both of which the government is off track to meet. The environmental charities Friends of the Earth and ClientEarth took joint legal action with the Good Law Project against the Department for Energy Security and Net Zero (DESNZ) over its decision to approve the carbon budget delivery plan (CBDP) in March 2023.
In a ruling on Friday, Mr Justice Sheldon upheld four of the five grounds of the groups' legal challenge, stating that the decision by the former energy security and net zero secretary Grant Shapps was "simply not justified by the evidence." He said: "If, as I have found, the secretary of state did make his decision on the assumption that each of the proposals and policies would be delivered in full, then the secretary of state's decision was taken on the basis of a mistaken understanding of the true factual position."
The judge agreed with ClientEarth and Friends of the Earth that the secretary of state was given "incomplete" information about the likelihood that proposed policies would achieve their intended emissions cuts. This breached section 13 of the Climate Change Act, which requires the secretary of state to adopt plans and proposals that they consider will enable upcoming carbon budgets to be delivered. Sheldon also agreed with the environment groups that the central assumption that all the department's policies would achieve 100% of their intended emissions cuts was wrong. The judge said the secretary of state had acted irrationally, and on the basis of an incorrect understanding of the facts. This comes after the Guardian revealed the government would be allowing oil and gas drilling under offshore wind turbines, a decision criticised by climate experts as "deeply irresponsible."
In a ruling on Friday, Mr Justice Sheldon upheld four of the five grounds of the groups' legal challenge, stating that the decision by the former energy security and net zero secretary Grant Shapps was "simply not justified by the evidence." He said: "If, as I have found, the secretary of state did make his decision on the assumption that each of the proposals and policies would be delivered in full, then the secretary of state's decision was taken on the basis of a mistaken understanding of the true factual position."
The judge agreed with ClientEarth and Friends of the Earth that the secretary of state was given "incomplete" information about the likelihood that proposed policies would achieve their intended emissions cuts. This breached section 13 of the Climate Change Act, which requires the secretary of state to adopt plans and proposals that they consider will enable upcoming carbon budgets to be delivered. Sheldon also agreed with the environment groups that the central assumption that all the department's policies would achieve 100% of their intended emissions cuts was wrong. The judge said the secretary of state had acted irrationally, and on the basis of an incorrect understanding of the facts. This comes after the Guardian revealed the government would be allowing oil and gas drilling under offshore wind turbines, a decision criticised by climate experts as "deeply irresponsible."
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In this case, it's UK's high court that may be guilty of scientific illiteracy.
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Canadians can only hope the same will happen with Trudeau's government and its silly carbon tax and what not else. They already got blamed for de-banking people protesting about its silly vaccine mandates and raising emergency measures for nothing.
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Wouldn't it be nice if nuclear plants weren't uninsurable, unless taxpayers assumed 90% of the cost of a cleanup if anything unfortunate happened.
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Re:Duh (Score:5, Informative)
Actually, it IS true in the US. Now I have to wonder: are you an actual liar, or just stupid? It's called the Price Anderson Act rather than the more accurate Screw the Taxpayer Act, and it's been around for decades. For ballpark cleanup costs, let's look at Fukushima. Cleaning up that nuclear mess is expected to cost Japan between $470 billion and $660 billion. And that's conservative. Some reasonable estimates go as high as $800 billion. And you point to a $75 billion fund? You're a joke.
https://environmentamerica.org/media-center/statement-federal-government-renews-policy-that-shifts-financial-risk-of-nuclear-accident-onto-taxpayers/ [environmentamerica.org] https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/clearing-the-radioactive-rubble-heap-that-was-fukushima-daiichi-7-years-on/ [scientificamerican.com]
Maybe I'll just ask your own question back at you: Do you ever feel bad about actively spreading misinformation?
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Irrelevant. Fukushima's cost is still on-going, still increasing and there's no end in sight.
Is there anything else I can help you with?
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I gave you the answer. You just don't like it. So how do you feel about actively spreading misinformation?
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Meanwhile both sides will oppose the actual workable solution which is nuclear.
Back in 2020 we saw Andrew Yang get some attention in his run for POTUS due in part to his support for nuclear power. While I can't prove causation there is some correlation to the Democrat party platform being changed around this time to support nuclear fission as part of the plank on energy and global warming. I haven't checked recently but as I recall the Democrat energy policy isn't all that different than that of the Republican party, at least as shown in their respective platform documents. If we d
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How much renewable energy infrastructure could be brought online at that price? & that's just for cleaning up the toxic, radioactive mess they've made so far, not for new nuclear power projects.
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The UK government, and both the major political parties, have committed tens of billions to nuclear. Cost is apparently not a consideration in their pursuit of it. Hinkley Point C is going to be the most expensive object on Earth when finished. They were so desperate to build it, they got the Chinese to invest in UK critical infrastructure and promised the most eye watering subsidies we have ever seen.
The UK seems to be hell bent on making nuclear happen, no matter the cost, or how long it takes. The idea t
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Are you advocating for a return to feudalism in the UK? Or maybe they should entertain a dictator ala Cromwell?
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... , to actually do fuck all?
I though the UK was quite known for its politicians in compromising positions.
"Mr Justice Sheldon" (Score:2)
Finally (Score:4, Insightful)
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I agree.
I wish more countries, including the U.S. were held to stricter plans, but those with the wealth (companies) and the one's controlling those (the ultra rich), will put profit over the people/planet every-time by kicking the can down the road, or just lying to us, like they have always done e.g. tobacco doesn't cause cancer, climate change isn't real, plastic is fully recyclable (the last two are the same companies and ultra rich using the former lever). We just don't have the checks and balances i
The UK has relatively low CO2 emissions per capita (Score:2)
The UK is near the bottom of the list of CO2 emissions for wealthy countries.
Annual CO emissions (per capita) tonnes per person:
Australia 15.0T
USA 14.9T
Canada 14.2T
South Korea 11.6T
Russia 11.4T
Japan 8.5T
China 8.0T
Germany 8.0T
Ireland 7.7T
Norway 7.5T
UK 4.7T
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Where's France on that list? 4.76T according to a list shown on Wikipedia, using data from EDGAR/EU.
The list in parent post must come from a different source because the list on Wikipedia shows UK at 5.00T.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org]
France produces a lot of electricity from nuclear fission and that lowers their CO2 emissions. They could do better with technologies like grid scale storage because as it is now they run their nuclear power plants at low capacity factors because their nuclear power plan
oh well (Score:2)