Low carbon summit doesn't add up

Investing in offshore wind, energy efficiency and renewable electricity links could make us a packet and slash carbon emissions. But the government aren't showing enough ambition

This morning, 'slightly shady' business secretary Peter Mandelson and 'could do better' PM Gordon Brown hosted a low carbon summit to unveil their plans for greening the UK manufacturing sector.

In theory it sounds great. Britain could finally get a bit of the green technology pie, catching up with countries like Germany, where they've created over 250,000 jobs, or the USA, where venture capitalists are flocking to wind and solar start-up companies.

Unfortunately the government's recent attempts at greening the economy have been relatively pathetic. Grand aspirations aren't backed by action. Gordon Brown's recently unveiled financial stimulus package included less investment in a green economy than almost any other G7 country. Oh dear.

Our director John summed it up:

"The prime minister says green policies need to be at the heart of economic recovery packages around the world, and Greenpeace agrees. It's the only way job creation can go hand in hand with a serious effort to tackle climate change. But the sad truth is that when it comes to stimulus packages that are green, Britain comes in at the bottom of the global league table."

With a bit of imagination on the part of the government, we could be raking it in. Britain has the best renewable energy resources in Europe. With the amount of coastline we've got and our notoriously temperamental weather, we could be generating huge amounts of energy from wind and wave power. Throw some better energy links to the continent into the mix, and we could be selling renewable energy to the rest of Europe.

We've could also be a lot better at using energy smartly. Our homes are leaky, poorly insulated, and energy wasteful - in fact, we have the worst housing stock of any European country. Our power stations waste up to two-thirds of the energy generated. That's bad for the climate, but it's also really stupid - the scale of energy wastage in Britain is shocking.

The good news is that there's dramatic potential for cutting our energy use. Energy is the quickest way of reducing emissions, tackling fuel poverty, creating tens of thousands of British jobs, and by reducing demand, can help provide real energy security.

Even better, the government themselves have calculated we could cut our energy use by more than 30 per cent, using only measures that will save more money than they cost to do... In other words, we could cut our energy use by a third, and make money doing so.

Britain could be the truly clean energy powerhouse of Europe. We could be making money, creating jobs and cleaning up our act. But it's going to take some serious investment, not just words from the government.