Date published: 2008/07/14
The BBC says:
The government has made "very poor progress" on reaching its own carbon emissions-cutting targets, MPs say.
Ministers want departments and agencies to reduce emissions by 12.5% by 2010/11 compared with 1999/2000 levels - and to be carbon-neutral by 2012.
But the influential environment audit committee said a cut of just 4% had been achieved by 2006/07.
Chairman Tim Yeo said this damaged the government's "moral authority" on environmental issues.
...
Members criticised the Ministry of Defence for claiming a big cut in emissions after it sold the defence agency QinetiQ.In reality, the committee said, the government was simply moving these emissions "off-balance sheet" to the private sector.
Anybody who thinks that government has any "moral authority" on any matter whatsoever is sadly deluded. And the emissions reduction allegedly achieved by selling QinetiQ is a classic government scam. Unfortunately the EU as a whole plays the same trick. The EU has exported large amounts of emissions to China, because goods which were once made in Europe are now made in China. Emissions should not be counted by who produces a good or service but by who consumes it.
Unfortunately the BBC also makes a complete hash of the story. So the alleged 4% reduction by 2006/07 might not be that bad given the 2010/11 target of 12.5%, because it depends when the target was set, which the BBC stupidly does not mention. And did the government really say it would reduce emissions by 12.5% by 2010/11 and by 100% by the following year (in order to be allegedly carbon neutral)? That is just silly. (But presumably the government is somehow planning to buy offsets, rather than really being carbon neutral, so this is another accounting scam.)
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