Monday, May 26, 2008

More green talk but little/no green action on renewable energy

No comments:
I recently wrote to my MP, Kerry McCarthy about renewable energy, especially generating on a small scale in many local situations (see here and take a look at EfficienCity for a great vision of a greener city whilst you're at it). I received a letter of reply a few days ago in which she states,

'I...support an expansion in our renewable energy generating capacity. I believe lessons can be learned from Europe in introducing the feed-in tariff and think that this is an area that should be further investigated to assess its suitability for the UK.'

Frankly, talking about further investigation is just not good enough because we've needed significant action for some time now - Germany has 200 times more solar power than the UK and we are very near the bottom of the EU renewable energy league along with places like Luxembourg and Malta !!

Why have successive governments not done much more? They have been more than willing to talk green whilst the consequences of dependence on coal, oil and gas have grown, with ever-rising fuel and food prices biting hard for instance. The long term stability, security and affordability of our economy depends a great deal on us breaking our oil addiction but governments have not made this happen.