The 300-350 Show

#2: Coal – Part Two

The 300-350 Show on July 24, 2008 | Make a Comment

Despite James Hansen’s personal plea to Prime Minister Gordon Brown last December to take a leadership role in initiating a global moratorium against unabated coal, the UK government’s Department for Business currently looks likely to grant permission to a new series of coal-fired power stations that are “Carbon Capture Ready”. We discuss what this means and why it’s not good enough with Dr Keith Allott, Head of WWF-UK’s Climate Change Campaign who commissioned a report recently exploring these questions.

We requested an interview with the Department of Business but had to make do with a written statement which explains that the UK is relying on the highly problematic and inadequate EU Emissions Trading Scheme to solve the problem.

Meanwhile in the US, the tide is turning against coal at the grassroots, state and even the federal levels – 59 applications for coal-fired power plants were cancelled, abandoned or put on hold in 2007 and there is a bill going through Congress to put a moratorium on new unabated coal developments. We speak to Mike Ewall of the Energy Justice Network who has played a key role in supporting and connecting up the grassroots campaigners who have been doggedly winning on a case by case basis.

We close the programme with a taster from a landmark speech made by Al Gore last week, where he suggests the US should respond to climate change with the due urgency the science now implies. He lays down a “moon landing” style challenge for the US to power itself by renewable energy within just ten years.

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#1: Coal – Part One

The 300-350 Show on July 17, 2008 | Make a Comment

James Hansen offered Gordon Brown an historic one-time-only leadership opportunity on climate change – will he take it?

Leading US climate scientist and director of NASA, Dr James Hansen, has made it clear that “preservation of climate requires that most remaining fossil fuel carbon is never emitted to the atmosphere” and that “the only realistic way to sharply curtail CO2 emissions is to phase out coal use except where CO2 is captured and sequestered.”

Over the last six months Hansen has taken the unusual step of writing in a personal capacity to various heads of states asking them to bring in a moratorium on new coal. The first letter he wrote was to Prime Minister Gordon Brown last December. He wrote:

“Your leadership is needed on a matter … with ramifications for life on our planet, including all species … [A] decision to phase out coal use unless the CO2 is captured is a global imperative, if we are to preserve the wonders of nature, our coastlines, and our social and economic well-being … If Britain and Germany halted construction of coal-fired power plants that do not capture and sequester the CO2 it could be a tipping point for the world.”

Our first guest is Leila Deen from the World Development Movement about the campaign against Gordon Brown’s plans to build seven new coal-fired power stations without requiring them to have Carbon Capture and Storage (CCS) technology.

Our second is Georgina Woods who speaks to us by ‘phone from Australia on the final day of the country’s first Camp for Climate Action – a week long event which culminated in the country’s biggest ever direct action against the country’s coal exporting industry.

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