Group of leading climate scientists, business figures, and civil society leaders publish open letter to Prime Minister Boris Johnson urging the government to beef up response to escalating climate crisis
Action to tackle climate change and biodiversity loss must be pursued with the same focus and urgency as the development and deployment of Covid vaccines, a group of business and academic leaders have told the Prime Minister in an open letter sent today.
Signed by UCL climate scientists, WWF, and executives from Arup, UPS, and members of the Aldersgate Group of businesses, the letter notes how more than 230 Covid vaccines are now in development, demonstrating "an unprecedented pace" of innovation in response to the coronavirus crisis. It adds that some of the key factors that have enabled rapid vaccine development, such as significant late stage direct investment, a strong underlying scientific base, focused institutional oversight and direction, and keen private sector awareness of prospective market value, must now be harnessed to help tackle the climate crisis.
The experts warn that despite a strong track record on emissions reductions, the UK is currently lagging behind other leading global economies such as the US, Germany, and Japan when it comes to developing solutions to climate change. Failure to invest in innovative clean technologies is putting UK business at risk of losing out in fast-growing green markets, they add.
Accordingly, the letter calls on Prime Minister Boris Johnson to establish a new Green Innovation and Sustainability Transformation Council that would be tasked with spearheading efforts to combine the government's stated ambition for a green industrial revolution with a new comprehensive approach to green innovation.
As part of this programme, the government should tap into the UK's "strong track record in pioneering 'regulatory sandboxes' to co-design regulation for new low carbon solutions," the letter advises.
Policymakers should also use pre-commercial public procurement as a way to strengthen the market for green technologies, it adds, enabling the private sector to invest with confidence in the technological leaps the UK needs. And it recommends that the new National Infrastructure Bank should be tasked with boosting investment in green solutions that are closest to market.
The letter's recommendations stem from a two year investigation by the UCL Green Innovation Policy Commission (GIPC), chaired by former CBI Director-General John Cridland, who is among the letter's signatories. The GIPC's final report, also published today, emphasises that the government should pay more attention to deploying proven clean technologies and solutions that are close to market, rather than focusing primarily on R&D, while simultaneously targeting a broader range of technologies and sectors in its policymaking.
"The UK can make a wholehearted decision to lead in the development and roll out of new low carbon goods and services, with the opportunities that can bring, or it can sit back and wait for others to take the risk but also to gain all the benefit," Cridland said.
The same GIPC report also calls on businesses to play a stronger role in the transition to a green economy. Companies should embed sustainability in their corporate culture and adopt net zero commitments and delivery plans, it argues, with sectoral associations taking a leadership and coordination role. Companies should also work together, with the support of government, to experiment with alternative business models, institutional arrangements, and disruptive technologies, the report found.
"The climate and Covid crises are very different - but they are both crises, and so far the push for rapid scale up of climate solutions has seen nothing like the scale of efforts that was put into developing a Covid vaccine," said Paul Ekins, Professor of Resources and Environmental Policy at UCL and director of the GIPC. "Now is exactly the moment when government should be doubling down, making the most of public support for decarbonisation and the need for economic stimulus to futureproof our economy.
"We can't afford to address decarbonisation a few technologies at a time, we need progress across the board, in less glamorous areas like water treatment as much as in showy new infrastructure," Ekins added.
Responding to the letter, a government spokesperson pointed to the Prime Minister's 10 Point Plan for a Green Industrial Revolution, published in November last year, and the Energy White Paper published the following month, as evidence of the "concrete steps we will take to build back greener from the pandemic and reach net zero emissions by 2050".
"Over the coming months, we will bring forward further bold proposals, including a Net Zero Strategy, to cut emissions and create new jobs and industries across the whole country - going further and faster towards building a stronger, more resilient future and protecting our precious planet for this generation and those to come," the spokesperson added.