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Author Archives: Admin
Top 20 Cities with Billions at Risk from Climate Change
July 2012: With the weather we’re currently experiencing, it’s interesting to read this Bloomberg article setting out that “More than 130 port cities around the world are at increasing risk from severe storm-surge flooding, damage from high storm winds, rising and warming global seas and local land subsidence. Poorly planned development often puts more people in vulnerable areas, too, increasing risk. About $3 trillion of assets are at risk today, a tally on track to reach $35 trillion by 2070, according to an ongoing study by the Organization of Economic Cooperation and Development.” Click through the slides to see the 20 port cities most vulnerable to climate extremes – which doesn’t fortunately include London.
London is however likely to face increased challenges associated with flooding – as set out in chapter 3 of the Mayor’s Climate Change Adaptation Strategy which highlights that:
- Nearly 15 per cent of London lies on the former flood plains of London’s rivers”
- A significant proportion of London lies within the Thames tidal floodplain and without the protection afforded by the tidal flood defences, much of that area would flood twice a day, everyday on each high tide
- The last tidal flood in London was in 1928, when 14 people drowned in Pimlico. In 1953, London narrowly escaped damage whena tidal surge inundated large parts of Kent and Essex, killing over 300 people. This resulted in the construction of the current Thames tidal defences, an integrated system comprising the Thames Barrier, 185 miles of floodwalls, 35 major gates and over 400 minor gates.
- The Thames Barrier has been operational since 1982 and has been closed over 100 times to protect London from flooding
The Museum of London’s 2011 ‘Postcards from the Future’ exhibition imagined what London might look like as a result of a number of future stress factors, including climate change. The 14 striking images, which include wind turbines in Piccadilly Circus, a nuclear power station in Kew Gardens and palm oil cultivation in Hyde Park, can be viewed here.
Free training events for Environmental Health Officers on assessing for excess cold
July 2012: National Energy Action (NEA) has received support from DECC to offer free training sessions to Environmental Health Officers on how to assess for Excess Cold. The London workshop appears to be hosted by the Haringey – however – exact venue/date details are note provided as yet. For more information on this free training click here.
Sustainable, resource efficient cities – Making it happen
July 2012: The United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) unveiled a new initiative that “aims to reduce pollution levels, improve resource efficiency and reduce infrastructure costs in cities across the world. Launched at the Rio+20 summit in Brazil, the Global Initiative for Resource-Efficient Cities will work with local and national governments, the private sector and civil society groups to promote energy efficient buildings, efficient water use, sustainable waste management and other activities.
“In a rapidly urbanizing world, cities are increasingly becoming the focus of international sustainability efforts. Up to 80 percent of the world population is expected to reside in cities by 2050. Today, urban areas account for 50 percent of all waste, generate 60-80 percent of all greenhouse gas emissions and consume 75 percent of natural resources, yet occupy only 3 percent of the Earth’s surface.”
Download ‘Sustainable Resource Efficient Cities – Making it Happen’ here.
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Exploring the Role of Cities and Buildings in the Green Economy
July 2012: A short paper produced by the US Green Building Council (USGBC), and launced at the recent Rio+20 sustainable development conference, which captures conversations taken across the US on current barriers to improving the energy efficiency of buildings. The conclusions have many parallels to problems faced here in London and the UK, including issues such as low awareness of the potential of energy savings, financial barriers and regulatory hurdles. The paper can be downloaded here (scroll half way down linked page).
Olympic Schools Retrofit Project
July 2012: The GLA has approved procurement of “specialist technical services to supervise and inspect energy efficiency works… during the delivery of RE:FIT to 12 schools as part of the Olympic Retrofit Project. It is estimated that these services will cost no more than £60,000.”
The approval form sets out the history to this project, which arose as a consequence of the shortfall in carbon emission savings and renewable energy generated on the London Olympics site due to the failure to secure a viable large-scale wind turbine project.
“The Olympic Retrofit project is a CO2 reduction project that will be fully funded by an ODA grant. It will be delivered with zero costs to the GLA. The ODA set ambitious targets within its 2007 Sustainable Development Strategy including a target “To achieve a reduction in carbon emissions for the built environment of 50 percent by 2013”. This subsequently became legally binding under a Section 106 agreement [Schedule 11]. The planning conditions for the Park also include a twenty percent renewable energy target, which contributes to the overall fifty percent carbon target. So far, the ODA has invested in a suite of carbon mitigation measures including energy efficiency; district heating and cooling from the Energy Centre; and renewable energy...
“The strategy to meet the renewable energy target on the Olympic Park had originally relied on a 2MW wind turbine that had received outline planning permission and was expected to deliver thirteen percent renewable energy for the Olympic Park. Diminished commercial interest however meant that the plan had to be abandoned. With consideration of cost and programme, the ODA could only reasonably deliver a further two percent renewable energy through the installation of photovoltaic (PV) panels on the Multi-Storey Car Park and the Main Press Centre. The overall impact is a gap in the ODA carbon target of circa 1,100 tonnes of CO2. The ODA assessed the options to compensate for the onsite shortfall and a local retrofit project based on the RE:NEW and RE:FIT models proved to be the best value for money. The ODA have amended their Section 106 agreement allowing funding of £1,700,000 to be spent on this compensation project to retrofit homes and schools within the host boroughs of Hackney, Newham, Tower Hamlets, and Waltham Forest.The ODA is a ‘sunset organisation’ meaning it has a limited timeframe for operation (related to the London 2012 Games) and so it was necessary to seek a third party to deliver the programme onbehalf of the ODA. The ODA identified the GLA as best-fit to deliver through the existing RE:NEWand RE:FIT models (see Appendix 1 of MD839).
“A project led by the GLA, in conjunction with the boroughs, comprised of RE:NEW-style treatments in homes and RE:FIT works within schools will achieve this objective. The ODA has grant funded the GLA, and the GLA has entered into a grant agreements with each ofthe host boroughs to deliver the RE:NEW-style measures within homes. The GLA has called-off from the RE:FIT framework and entered into a service contract with EDF Energy. EDF Energy are currently undertaking an investment grade proposal for the portfolio of 12 schools.”
A recent update on the scope the RE:FIT project is available in the following June 2012 conference presentation – ‘The London Experience of RE:FIT’. A tender was issued in June by Mayor for companies to be added to the RE:FIT procurement framework. More on RE:FIT here.
Posted in News
Tagged Hackney, Newham, Olympics, RE:FIT, Schools, Tower Hamlets, Waltham Forest
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‘Plans for London green deal model’
July 2012: Inside Housing exclusively reports that the Mayor has “instructed the Greater London Authority to explore creating a pan-London green deal procurement framework and promotion and referrals organisation which councils could use to deliver energy saving measures across their housing stock. The GLA aims to retrofit 2.4 million homes in London by 2020 at a potential cost of £10 billion…
Richard Blakeway, London deputy mayor for housing, land and property, said: ‘The mayor has tasked City Hall officers to scope out a range of proposals for how we can make the government’s green deal work best for the capital.
‘No final approach has been decided, but we want to maximise the value of the green deal for Londoners by presenting the most powerful case for funds and to reverse the historic poor uptake of predecessor schemes in London, such as the carbon emissions reductions target.” Read the full story here. More on the Mayor’s RE:NEW programme here.
London continues role with C40
June 2012: The Mayor has recently approved London’s continuing role on the Management Board of C40 Cities Climate initiative. C40 membership comprises 40 global cities and 19 affiliate cities. The direction of the C40 is set by a Steering Committee (SC) comprising of Berlin, Hong Kong, Jakarta, Johannesburg, LosAngeles, London, New York City, Sao Paulo, Seoul and Tokyo. The approval form highlights that “London has been instrumental in developing the C40. London has held the Chair of the C40 and remained at its core as it has continued to develop. It also hosts the Secretariat of the C40.“
The C40 are currently looking to fill a number of posts including a Regional Director for Europe, and a Director for Administration.
Additional support for RE:NEW
June 2012: The Mayor has released information highlighting that he is procuring additional consultancy support from the Energy Saving Trust (EST) for the delivery of his home energy efficiency retrofit schemes, RE:NEW.
The Mayoral approval form states that:
“Between April 2009 and the end of March 2012 64,000 homes have been retrofitted, 17,543 tonnes CO2 per annum will have been saved and £7.3 million additional funding levered in. The budget for this programme was £7.8 million. Approval has recently been received to continue this work (with £3.3 million allocated in the GLA budget) in 2012-13. This would see RE:NEW delivery continue while funding remains to be levered in. In addition to this, it would start building up a pipeline of Green Deal assessments.
The approval highlights the shortfall in funding to London from the main national energy efficiency programme, the Carbon Emissions Reduction Target (CERT):
“The fundamental barriers to greater retrofitting activity in London are the inherent costs of retrofitting and the number of hard to treat properties in London. This makes it difficult to attract London’s fair-share of activity through the current national delivery model (CERT), let alone the level of activity needed to meet the 60% carbon reduction target by 2025. The latest data, 2009-2011, highlights how little activity London receives compared to other regions (see table below). As London represents 12.8 per cent of the UK population London lost out on an estimated £100 million in energy efficiency funding over the period.”
| Cavity Wall Insulation | Loft Insulation | Number of homes treated | Percentage of homes treated | |
| London | 54,533 | 89,957 | 131,952 | 4.2% |
| England, Scotland and Wales | 1,372,307 | 1,727,392 | 2,615,980 | 10.0% |
Seven climate change lessons from the cities of Europe
June 2012: London’s programmes to help reduce the carbon impact of the city are included in a new Carbon Disclosure Project (CDP) and Accenture study. Seven climate change lessons from the cities of Europe examines seven actions that leading European cities are taking to manage climate change in their cities. Further details on an Accenture press release and the following BusinessGreen article.
New Climate Local Initiative Launched
28 June 2012: Waltham Forest, Islington, Camden and Sutton are amongst the first 18 local authorities to sign up to a new ‘Climate Local Commitment’ launched today at the Local Government Association’s (LGA) annual conference. Climate Local “will see councils committing to their own local actions to reduce carbon emissions and improve their ability to protect people and services from the anticipated changes in the weather.”
Climate Local will build on the Nottingham Declaration, launched in 2000, and the LGA news release states that “As part of the new scheme, local authorities will be sharing ideas and advice on the best ways to save money on their gas and electricity use and ensure there are preparations in place for keeping to a minimum disruption caused by extreme weather like snow, floods and heat waves.”
Further details are posted on the Climate Local webpage which includes the Climate Local Commitment form and also a Climate Local Information Pack for local authorities.
Ed Davey, the Secretary of State for Energy, spoke at the conference stating that “…the role of councils in energy and climate change policy is much, much greater than even the LGA may currently think…I want to set out three strategic roles for local authorities in energy and climate change. First, in buying energy. Second, in saving energy. Third, in generating energy.”
On the Green Deal, Mr Davey said: “Local authorities and communities, who have the trust and faith of local people, will be essential partners in delivering the Green Deal.
Local authorities are leading work on financing models and joining together to create community interest companies. Six are involved in the Green Deal Finance Company.
Some are taking huge leaps forward – like Birmingham, which is pushing ahead with a £1.5 billion Energy Savers scheme, or Newcastle, which is leading a Green Deal partnership scheme which spans the North East. The GLA is bringing together the London boroughs.“
Posted in News
Tagged Camden, Carbon Emissions, Climate Adaptation, Green Deal, Islington, Local Authorities, Sutton, Waltham Forest
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