Data published this year fell short of the government's code of practice, says statistics watchdog chief

Ministers were accused of exaggerating Britain's success in fighting climate change today. The government's statistics watchdog said figures on carbon dioxide emissions could "mislead" the public.

Sir Michael Scholar, chairman of the UK Statistics Authority, said presentation of the data by the Department of Energy and Climate Change (DECC) was "unsatisfactory".

In a letter to Tim Yeo, the chairman of the House of Commons Environmental Audit Committee, he said a statistical bulletin released in February "fell short" of the government's code of practice. Scholar raised serious concerns about the claim that CO2 emissions had fallen by 12.8% compared to 1990 levels.

But nearly a third of that fall is made up of carbon credits purchased by polluters in an EU trading scheme and do not represent actual cuts in UK emissions. Without the credits, the fall is a much more modest 8.5%. Scholar said ministers should in future include a clearer explanation of how the figures are calculated.

He said: "In this case, the figures mentioned are, in our view, likely to be used by non-expert observers to judge progress in reducing CO2 emissions within the UK.

"We regard the quoted figures, and particularly the percentage change, as unsatisfactory in the context of that use."

Yeo said the figures were not being used in a "straightforward way" and called on ministers to put right the problem "as soon as possible".

"The committee has had some concerns about this presentation for some time so I'm not surprised by this," he said. "It's very important if the government is going to maintain the confidence of the public and the green lobby that they should be absolutely objective and straightforward about it.

"It's a very complex area and there are already a number of confusions surrounding claims about emissions reductions."

• Carbon emissions
• Climate change
• Green politics
• Energy

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Shock jock turns on Andy Revkin after his comments on population and greenhouse gas emissions

US radio host Rush Limbaugh's main reason for existence is to go too far — and then drag mainstream conservative discourse out there with him.

But even by Limbaugh's standards — and remember this is a man who has over the years referred to Greenpeace and Sierra Club as "econazis" and "environmentalist wackos" — he seems to have gone the extra mile in calling the New York Times environmental reporter, Andy Revkin, a jihadi and a terrorist and telling him to kill himself.

As Revkin's colleague, Paul Krugman, says on his blog: "Always good to know what we're dealing with."

Limbaugh started off by ranting against militant environmentalists likening them to "jihad guys" (Media Matters for America has audio):

They convince these families to strap explosives on who? Not them. On their kids. Grab your 3-year-old, grab your 4-year-old, grab your 6-year-old, and we're gonna strap explosives on there, and then we're going to send you on a bus, The jihad guys have to maintain control. The environmentalist wackos are the same way.

Then Limbaugh turns on Revkin:

This guy from The New York Times, if he really thinks that humanity is destroying the planet, humanity is destroying the climate, that human beings in their natural existence are going to cause the extinction of life on Earth — Andrew Revkin. Mr Revkin, why don't you just go kill yourself and help the planet by dying?

The talk show host was raging about remarks Revkin delivered by Skype to a conference last week in which he talked about how population growth would raise greenhouse gas emissions. Revkin covers much of the territory in a column in his Dot Earth blog last month that asked — stating clearly that he was not making any such proposal — whether there would be a possibility one day of spinning off a carbon market from contraceptives. That is, if population growth means more emissions, should there be credit for limiting future children?

Now it's not entirely clear what set Limbaugh off on his anti-Revkin rant. The column was published more than a month ago; the conference last week was not widely covered although it was reported by a Christian news service. Revkin repeatedly makes clear he is not advocating forced population control – let alone call for suicide bombings to promote greener policies. Not that any of this would faze Limbaugh.

But it's worth noting that Limbaugh is the second figure on the right to equate environmentalism with terrorism in just a few days.

Daryl Metcalfe, a state representative in Pennsylvania, who like Limbaugh has a history of attacking gays, Muslims and others, reached his own personal low this week when he called a veterans' group "traitors" for supporting a climate change bill.

The connection is important. The White House and Democratic leaders in the Senate over the last few weeks have been finding traction among voters with the argument that dependence on fossil fuel poses a national security threat.

Operation Free, a group of Afghan and Iraq war veterans this week began taking that argument on the road, with a bus tour to persuade Americans that catastrophic climate change is a security risk — which is now the official position of the CIA and the Pentagon.

Not that the Pentagon or CIA apparently rank as security experts to Metcalfe. He wrote an email to the group saying:

Any veteran lending their name, to promote the leftist propaganda of global warming and climate change, in an effort to control more of the wealth created in our economy, through cap and tax type policies, all in the name of national security, is a traitor to the oath he or she took to defend the Constitution of our great nation!

Remember Benedict Arnold before giving credibility to a veteran who uses their service as a means to promote a leftist agenda. Drill Baby Drill!!!

The veterans are demanding an apology.

As for Revkin, he says Limbaugh's rant is a distraction from a deadly serious issue:

This might be funny, in a sad way, if it weren't for the fact that my mailbox is already heaped with hate mail. And of course there's the reality that explosive population growth in certain places, particularly sub-Saharan Africa, could be blunted without a single draconian measure, many experts say, simply by providing access to family planning for millions of women who already want it, but can't get it — whether or not someone gets a carbon credit in the process.

• Climate change scepticism
• United States
• Climate change
• Radio industry

Suzanne Goldenberg
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The Guardian's quick carbon calculator shows the steps you can take to reduce your carbon emissions

You've calculated your carbon footprint. You know if you have footprints from clown shoes (nearly 20 tonnes, like the US) or baby ones (just over 1 tonne, like the average Indian). Now it's time to try cutting your emissions down to size, hopefully bringing them towards the magic 3.1 tonne figure that UK "per capita" carbon footprints must reach by 2050 for a sustainable future.

Here are our guides to slimming your footprint:

• Green your home - from eco bulbs to major insulation, everything you need to know about saving energy at home

• Chris Goodall shows you how to cut 10% off your footprint for the 10:10 campaign

• How to cut your footprint if you live in rented accomodation

• Get more tips and ideas in our Green Living Blog and Ask Leo and Lucy, our archive of green living answers

Plus some inspirational stories of people who've cut their footprint:

• Guardian columnist Madeleine Bunting on her baffling journey to a low carbon life

• One woman's war on energy waste

• Actor Pete Postlethwaite explains how he cut this footprint

• Couple Tracey and Colin Codhunter: 'We're not eco warriors'

And finally, some useful external resources for cutting carbon:

• The Energy Saving Trust - consumer tips, energy efficient products and info on eco grants from the government's official energy-saving agency

• 10:10 - advice and energy-saving tips from the 10:10 carbon-cutting climate campaign

• Act On CO2 - the government's official carbon calculator, plus useful data such as league tables of the most efficient cars (which you can also find on our environment data store)

• Carbon footprints
• Carbon emissions
• Climate change
• Ethical and green living
• Energy efficiency

Adam Vaughan
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Our carbon calculator is more sophisticated and more accurate than any other on the internet

Our new carbon footprint calculator is designed to help individuals get a meaningful sense of their contribution to climate change – and what they can do to reduce it. We created the tool in response to the fact that, although there are loads of calculators out there, none of them really do what we feel they should.

One problem is that existing carbon calculators tend to focus exclusively our consumption of gas, electricity, car fuel and flights. Significant as these emissions sources are, they only add up to around half of the average footprint. The other half is made up of all the other goods and services we purchase – everything from food to gadgets to healthcare. These "indirect" emissions often get missed out, so our tool includes them and aims to provide a more rounded picture of the emissions we're each responsible for.

Instead of entering precise numbers for only a part of your carbon footprint (gas and electricity bills), you enter more approximate information for all of it. To keep things simple, we've also designed the calculator just for individuals - it doesn't look at households or include emissions from your workplace. We hope this makes it quicker to use, as well as giving ameaningful result. To create the tool, we started off with a summary of the UK's total carbon footprint, including those emissions embedded in the goods we import from China and other countries. The summary breaks down the total into 15 key areas – everything from domestic electricity use through to the manufacture of paper products and cars.

Next, we divided these 15 numbers by the UK's population to provide a comprehensive breakdown of the carbon footprint of a typical UK resident. Then we created a set of sliders that enable you to change each figure to reflect your own lifestyle.

If you're interested in the detailed methodology behind the calculator, here a few points about the data:

• The figures for UK emissions are based on a sophisticated "input-output model" created by Small World Consulting. They include all the Kyoto greenhouse gases (such as methane and nitrous oxide as well as CO2) and are adjusted for imports and exports. In other words, the figures are as close as we can get to an accurate summary of the carbon footprint of all the goods and services that UK citizens consume.

• Since the Small World input-output model exists only for the UK, the figures for different countries shown to the right of the tool are approximate. We've arrived at them using data for national emissions and imports and exports, so they should be considered as indicative rather than precise.

• We've tentatively included for comparison a figure for a "sustainable" footprint. We've plumped for 3.1 tonnes by 2050, based on the UK's target for an 80% cut in emissions by 2050 but factoring in carbon from goods in addition. But we're well aware that what counts as a sustainable footprint depends on a whole host of assumptions, including how quickly we reduce our emissions and how much risk of runaway climate change we're prepared to accept. Again, then, this is just an indicative number. Some people would argue that the only truly sustainable footprint is a non-existent one.

• For more information on what's included in each slider, click on the question marks next to each one on the calculator.

Lastly, it's worth saying the calculator is very much a continual work in progress, so if you have suggestions for features or improvements, let us know in the comments below. Equally, we're keen to answer any questions you have about the data too.

• Click here for tips on cutting your carbon footprint.

• Carbon footprints
• Carbon emissions
• Climate change

Duncan Clark
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Calculate the impact of your travel, home and shopping habits with our simple carbon footprint calculator

Duncan ClarkMairead O'Connor

Advertising Standards Authority to look into £6m campaign accused of scaremongering and misleading the public

The advertising regulator has launched an investigation into the government's climate change TV campaign after receiving more than 350 complaints accusing it of scaremongering and misleading the public.

The Department of Energy and Climate Change launched the £6m campaign, in which the government states for the first time that scientific evidence has confirmed that climate change is man-made, earlier this month.

The Advertising Standards Authority has received 357 complaints about the campaign.

Some of the complaints argued that there is no scientific evidence of climate change. Others claimed there was a division of scientific opinion on the issue and that the ad should therefore not have attributed global warming to human activity.

Another complaint was that the ad, which features a father telling his daughter a scary bedtime story about climate change in which a cartoon dog drowns, is inappropriate for children because it is "upsetting and scaremongering".

The ASA has said it intends to investigate the complaints and the assertions on which the campaign has been based.

The campaign marked a step change in the tone of the government's marketing around its Act on CO2 initiative. The DECC came out with the hard-hitting message after research showed that more than half of the UK public think climate change will have no effect on them.

Last week the DECC defended the campaign, and the science behind it, arguing that the goal is to "protect the next generation".

"It is consistent with government policy on the issue, which is informed by the latest science and assessments of peer-reviewed, scientific literature made by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), and other international bodies," said the energy and climate change minister Joan Ruddock.

• To contact the MediaGuardian news desk email editor@mediaguardian.co.uk or phone 020 3353 3857. For all other inquiries please call the main Guardian switchboard on 020 3353 2000.

• If you are writing a comment for publication, please mark clearly "for publication".

• Advertising Standards Authority
• Advertising
• Television industry
• Climate change
• Climate change scepticism
• Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC)
• Marketing & PR

Mark Sweney
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Luke Harding reports from northern Siberia on the effects of global warming

Luke Harding

There are now less than 50 days until the crucial climate summit begins in Copenhagen, but the international negotiations are failing to make the progress we need. This week many of the key people with the ability to break the deadlock in these talks met behind closed doors at the Major Economies Forum that Ed Miliband hosted in London (Miliband: climate change pact uncertain, 20 October).

To unblock the UN process, rich countries must demonstrate to the developing countries that they are serious about getting an ambitious, fair and legally binding agreement at Copenhagen in December.

That means developed countries urgently need to commit new money to help pay for low-carbon growth in developing countries. We estimate this will require a commitment of more than $160bn from developed countries each year by 2020. Developed countries must also urgently offer bold emissions cuts of more than 40% in their carbon emissions below 1990 levels between now and 2020.

These two issues of money and ambitious reductions must top the agenda ahead of Copenhagen. Now is the time for the backroom deals to end, and for real leadership and action to begin.

John Sauven Greenpeace UK, Barbara Stocking Oxfam GB, Graham Wynne RSPB, Dr Daleep Mukarji Christian Aid, Matthew Frost Tearfund, Chris Bain Cafod, Andy Atkins Friends of the Earth, David Nussbaum WWF-UK, Ashok Sinha Stop Climate Chaos Coalition

• Today MPs will vote on whether the House of Commons and the whole of government should join the 10:10 campaign. This would commit government to cutting its own emissions by 10% next year.

Climate change is the biggest threat to health that we face this century and, as the largest public sector employer in Europe, the NHS has a huge part to play in creating a sustainable, low-carbon, healthy future for us all. Already it is taking up the challenge, with over 40 NHS trusts and other healthcare organisations already signed up to 10:10, and more joining all the time.

We urge members of parliament to show that they are prepared to take the necessary action to prevent the global health catastrophe that runaway climate change would cause. Signing up government including the Department of Health is an important first step and sends a strong message to everyone.

Dr David Pencheon NHS Sustainable Development Unit, Prof Hugh Montgomery University College London Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust, Prof Ian Gilmore Royal College of Physicians, Prof Mike Gill Climate & Health Council, Muir Gray Campaign for Greener Healthcare, Dr Richard Horton The Lancet, Dr Robin Stott Climate & Health Council

• Lord Hunt's assertion that "Putting nuclear energy at the very heart of our low-carbon economy is part of our credibility going into the climate summit in Copenhagen," rests on a dangerously naive world-view (UK is ideal for new nuclear power, 19 October). Developing country governments will look at these plans to power a high-consumption economy that many of them aspire to. This may well mean a 2050 world of hundreds of nuclear power plants across Latin America, sub-Saharan Africa and Asia.

We need to leave not only the technology of the 20th century behind, but political attitudes too. In a highly interconnected world, large-scale investment in technologies we would like to see replicated around the world should be at the heart of the UK government's response to climate change.

Dr Simon Lewis

Earth and Biosphere Institute

• George Monbiot "would choose nuclear dumping over climate breakdown" as if this were the nub of the matter (Repulsive it may be, but climate crash would be worse, 20 October). Could he explain how many nuclear power stations worldwide would be needed to prevent climate breakdown? Has he a timetable for the worldwide construction and costing of these, that would deliver the required carbon reduction in time? And what about the substantial energy poverty of those who live in isolated environments, far away from these heavy industrial plants?

Surely a more radical and imaginative proposal would be the adoption of existing low-tech methods and the localisation of energy supplies and conservation, with the resultant self-sufficiency and increase in living standards.

Val Mainwood

Wivenhoe, Essex

• Nuclear power is not the only energy industry with a waste disposal problem.The "spent fuel" from burning coal and oil is called carbon dioxide. Disposing of CO2 properly ("carbon capture") is a much harder problem than nuclear waste disposal because: there is 10,000 times as much waste per unit of energy produced; CO2 is a high-pressure reactive gas, not an inert solid; CO2 has to be sequestered for ever.

So here is the solution to nuclear waste disposal: for every 1,000 kg of CO2 pumped into an underground disposal site, drop in 1kg of high-level nuclear waste as a vitreous gravel.

Andrew Coulson

Musselburgh, East Lothian

• While pointing out the exorbitant cost of nuclear power (A power play the consumer is bound to lose, 19 October), you assert that there is "no difference" between whether these costs are borne by consumers or the taxpayer. This is wrong – the difference is significant. Around 4 million households in the UK currently live in fuel poverty. Saddling these households with the burden of the nuclear bill is extremely regressive. By contrast, use of the taxation system makes for a progressive policy.

Darryl Croft

Hockley, Essex

• Can I assume that single people will be exempt (Families face nuclear tax on power bills, 19 October)?

David Page

Brighton

• Climate change
• 10:10 climate change campaign
• Copenhagen climate change conference 2009
• Carbon emissions
• Carbon capture and storage (CCS)
• Nuclear power
• Nuclear waste
• Local government
• Local politics
• Conservatives
• Liberal Democrats
• Labour

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GM techniques will help crops survive harsher climates, as populations grow and global warming worsens, says report

Research to develop genetically modified crops must be stepped up as part of a £2bn "grand challenge" to avoid future food shortages, an influential panel of scientists said yesterday. In its report, the Royal Society said that GM techniques would be needed to boost yields and help crops survive harsher climates, as the global population rises and global warming worsens.

But the report said GM was not the only answer, and that measures to improve crop management, such as improved irrigation, were needed too.

Professor David Baulcombe, a plant scientist at the University of Cambridge who chaired the study, said: "We need to take action now to stave off food shortages. If we wait even five to 10 years, it may be too late. Biological science has progressed in leaps and bounds in the last decade and UK scientists have been at the head of the pack when it comes to topics related to food crops. In the UK we have the potential to come up with viable scientific solutions for feeding a growing population and we have a responsibility to realise this potential. There's a very clear need for policy action and publicly funded science to make sure this happens."

The Royal Society said the government should reverse a decay in agricultural research in Britain and spend at least £200m each year for the next 10 years on science that improves crops and sustainable crop management.

The report said the changing diets of people around the world, the likely impact of climate change and growing scarcity of water and land made it harder to increase food production to meet an expected rise in global population of 3 billion by the mid-century. Production methods would need to sustain the environment, preserve natural resources and support the livelihoods of farmers and rural populations around the world, it added.

The report came as John Beddington, chief scientific adviser to the government, said a "range of solutions" would be needed to feed a growing world population.

Baulcombe added: "There is no panacea for ensuring global food security. Science-based approaches introduced alongside social science and economic innovations are essential if we're to have a decent chance of feeding the world's population in 40 years' time. Technologies that work on a farm in the UK may have little impact for harvests in Africa. Research is going to need to take into account a diverse range of crops, localities, cultures and numerous other circumstances."

Anti-GM campaigners criticised the report, which they said was at odds with a separate report on future food production produced last year by the International Assessment of Agricultural Science and Technology for Development (IAASTD), which said there was little role for GM, as currently practised, in feeding the poor on a large scale.

Kirtana Chandrasekaran of Friends of the Earth said: "Science has a key role to play in reducing hunger and poverty, but the report's focus on GM crops ignores mounting evidence that this technology is failing. GM crops are an extension of big-business factory farming that is already wiping out wildlife, destroying communities and making climate change worse. Any attempt to combat the global food crisis must also address its root causes, such as industrial livestock production and a narrow focus on increasing yields."

Tom MacMillan, executive director of the Food Ethics Council, said: "They get ahead of themselves by demanding £2bn more for science. That's exactly the kind of decision that should be up for wider debate. The money might be better spent tackling the social and economic problems that affect whether growing more food makes a jot of difference to food security."

Julian Little, chairman of the Agricultural Biotechnology Council, which represents GM crop companies, said: "Farmers must be given access to all the proven tools available to help them produce more food in a more sustainable way. This should include advanced crop breeding using biotechnology and GM methods, which are already being used by more than 13 million farmers around the world and helping to deliver higher and more reliable crop yields while mitigating major threats to crop production, such as damaging effects of pests, diseases and droughts."

• GM
• Food
• Farming
• Climate change
• Climate change
• Population

David Adam
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European environment ministers are set to agree a cut in the carbon emissions from flying, the Guardian has learned.

In Brussels tomorrow representatives of the 27 states of the European Union are expected to agree on a 10% cut for aviation by 2020, relative to 2005, as part of its negotiating position at the upcoming UN summit on climate change in Copenhagen.

Aviation is the fastest growing source of greenhouse gases, but politicians have been reluctant to act, as the number of passengers and flights is rising sharply. But earlier this year Ed Miliband, energy and climate change secretary, said that the UK would return emissions to 2005 levels by 2050. "I don't want to have a situation where only rich people can afford to fly," he said.

Quentin Browell, of the International Air Transport Association, questioned whether the 10% cut was achievable. "We're looking at 1.5% improvement in fuel efficiency each year, the vast majority from new planes joining the fleet. The 10% does not look realistic."

On another issue, EU finance ministers failed to agree on the funding it will give the developing world to cope with global warming, a setback for the deal negotiators hope to deliver in Copenhagen.

A call from the chancellor, Alistair Darling, for the EU to commit to €10bn, of which Britain would contribute €1bn, went unheeded. The European Commission has proposed €15bn a year by 2020. The European parliament's environment committee this week put the figure at €30bn, but environmental lobby groups talk of €35bn.

"It's a disappointing outcome," admitted Anders Borg, the Swedish finance minister, who chaired the meeting. "There's obviously been a lack of commitment."

With fewer than 50 days to the Copenhagen summit, differences between states over how to split the bill wrecked preparation of such a deal at its last attempt, before an EU summit in Brussels next week.

The argument is between richer west Europeans and the poorer, newer member states from central and eastern Europe who are seeking to minimise their share of the overall bill. Eliot Whittington, at Christian Aid, said: "There is only one week of formal negotiations left before Copenhagen. Brinksmanship of this nature is a betrayal of millions of poor people."

• Carbon emissions
• European Union
• Airline industry
• Air transport
• Travel and transport
• Climate change

Alok JhaIan Traynor
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The idea that a few new reactors can solve climate change is attractive – and completely unrealistic

If you are a minister in a government that spent its first 10 years in office talking on and on about the merits of energy efficiency and renewable power, but actually doing very little about it, then conjuring up a programme of nuclear power as a "get out when all else fails" sort of makes sense.

If you are chief executive of a large energy company in a country where the regulatory system does not permit you to make much money on your renewable investments, and no money at all from selling fewer electrons (to increase efficiency) rather than more, then taking a punt on a couple of nuclear reactors definitely makes sense. All the more so since you can pretty much guarantee that the government will pick up the tab for anything that goes wrong.

If you're a citizen of that country and increasingly concerned about climate change and the need to find alternatives to fossil fuels in order to cut emissions of greenhouse gases, then you might reluctantly conclude that there's no alternative but to replace nuclear reactors that are due for decommissioning.

If, like me, you are the former chair of the Sustainable Development Commission, which battled in vain for years to persuade the government that there are far better ways of meeting objectives on climate change, then all these pretexts for resuscitating our moribund nuclear industry remain utterly unconvincing.

The commission came to that opinion after nearly two years of research. We reviewed all available data on costs, waste, uranium, emissions reduction, safety, proliferation, security risks, and the impact of any new reactors on energy options. As dispassionately as we were able, we highlighted both the benefits of nuclear power and the disbenefits in each of those areas. The majority of us (with two of 18 commissioners dissenting)came to the conclusion that the disbenefits clearly outweighed the benefits.

A lot of it comes down to who you believe. For those with long memories, it's still difficult to attach much credibility to the promises of the nuclear industry. Two years ago it was the consensus view that companies bidding for new reactors would require no subsidy. Six months ago that bold (and some would say preposterous) assertion was put aside with a much more honest acknowledgement from E.ON, EDF and others that substantial amounts of public money would be required after all. Indeed, the case was made that the government would have to stop subsidising renewables in order to prioritise nuclear.

This change of heart may well have been influenced by the fiasco at Olkiluoto in Finland, where the new reactor is already massively behind schedule and over budget. This is the same reactor design that will apparently be rolled out here in the UK. Even the staunchest advocates of nuclear power concede that it's extremely difficult unearthing the true story about its cost. We do know, courtesy of the Nuclear Decommissioning Agency, that UK taxpayers face a bill of at least £70bn over the next 20 years or so for cleaning up the legacy of our existing nuclear facilities. Faced with that kind of reality, as we move into a period of inevitable austerity, it remains incomprehensible to me that the Treasury has now set aside its traditional scepticism about nuclear power.

For me, nuclear power is the lazy option. Stick up a few more reactors, don't say too much about costs per kilowatt hour (let alone costs for each tonne of CO2 abated), dump the responsibility of dealing with the waste on future generations, and don't worry too much about the state of the grid or the impact on renewable energy.

I can't deny that the alternative course of action (reducing total energy consumption by at least 40%, massively ramping up investments both in large-scale renewables – including the Severn barrage – and small-scale microgeneration, making a proper go of Combined Heat and Power and "Energy From Waste" schemes, and relying on combined-cycle gas turbines for base load generation) is the harder option in terms of the quality of leadership required. But those still wavering about the balance of pros and cons should not underestimate the knock-on effects of any commitment to new nuclear. It will undoubtedly slow investment in new renewables. It will reassure politicians that they don't have to do the heavy lifting required to put energy efficiency at the heart of any strategy. It will weaken efforts to move towards localised distributed energy solutions (why else do you think the industry and pro-nuclear civil servants fought so hard against feed-in tariffs for so many years?), and it will "lock us in" to today's hugely inefficient generation and transmission system for the next 40 years or so.

And the tragedy is it won't make much difference anyway – even if the reactors do eventually get built after inevitable delay. If every OECD country follows this route, instead of pursuing the alternative mapped out above, then emissions of greenhouse gases will keep rising at a dangerously fast level, average temperatures will soar, the Greenland ice cap will melt far faster than anticipated – and all those shiny new reactors will be several metres under water. Oh, for a little bit of realism.

• Nuclear power
• Renewable energy
• Nuclear waste
• Energy
• Climate change
• Finland

Jonathon Porritt
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The survival of the indigenous Nenets people is under grave threat as they contend with a tundra made increasingly unpredictable by the changing climate

Our money is being used by RBS without restraint. We have a right to impose environmental and human rights standards

Today we are taking the government to court – Her Majesty's Treasury to the high courts of justice on the Strand to be precise.

The application – made by Platform, World Development Movement and People & Planet – for a judicial review of the Treasury's lack of adequate environmental and human rights considerations in the investment mandate set out for the Royal Bank of Scotland (RBS), will be considered by a judge. From here we could set a precedent that would ensure climate change criteria is adhered to when spending public money; we could also make an industry-wide push towards low-carbon financing within the finance sector that currently drives fossil fuel expansion.

After months of fiercely attempted rebuffs from the Treasury, Judge Hickinbottom called for an oral hearing that was due to last at least half a day – ordinarily oral hearings are given 20 minutes of court time. Despite the Treasury's protestations that we the claimants "have no case", they have assigned one of their top barristers, James Eadie, the "Treasury Devil", to handle the case.

In the year since the initial bailout of RBS, we have seen taxpayers' money spent on financing deals with various oil companies including: Cairn Energy, who are currently exploring the Arctic, ConocoPhillips and Tullow Oil. RBS subsidiary ABN Amro has made several loans to Vedanta, the controversial mining company that the government itself last week slammed for mistreatment of tribal peoples in Orissa, India. Most recently, a decision has been made to finance Hargreaves Services, the coal operator. Hargreaves has plans to extract 7m tonnes of coal by developing one of the largest opencast coal mines in the country at Tower Colliery, near the coal-mine-cum-protest-site Ffos-y-fran in Merthyr Tydfil, south Wales. This type of mining has been likened to a financial hit-and-run, bringing a few jobs for a couple of years and potentially leaving widespread asthma and other public health and environmental effects in the community for years to come.

The Treasury's defence has thus far argued that UK Financial Investments (the separate company it set up to manage the shares in bailed-out banks purchased with taxpayers' money) will not impose environmental or human rights standards on RBS. It argues that this is in order to "protect and create value for the taxpayer as shareholder". In other words, according to the Treasury, protecting the environment and human rights would not be valued by the British taxpayers. We beg to differ. We believe the British public would not like their money to be used to fund ecological destruction, climate chaos, or human rights abuses – thousands have already signed an online petition pulling Alistair Darling up on this issue.

Hypocritically, the government urges companies and institutional investors to raise standards on environmental, social and governance issues. It has even said "environmental and human rights measures should be taken on an industry-wide basis" – essentially, "somebody ought to regulate this", which is funny, because that's a point we've made several times ourselves. Yet its first attempt to do this, the Climate Change Act, trumpeted by the government on release as the first national legal framework to curb emissions, it feebly calls a "target duty only".

We have also released an independent report commissioned by Platform and others, entitled Towards a Royal Bank of Sustainability: Protecting Taxpayers' Interests, Cutting Carbon Risk. Written by institutional investment expert Nick Silver, it lays out the business case for UK Financial Investments to act as a responsible investor with the shares it manages, influencing company policy in ways recommended by the UN Environment Programme Finance Initiative, the UN's Principles for Responsible Investment and the government itself. It points out that not only will the consumption of fossil fuels financed by RBS and the UK taxpayer push us over carbon emission reduction targets but that upcoming regulatory frameworks will drastically affect the value of the so-called "safe" investments in RBS's portfolio. Effective carbon-cutting policies and their parallel support for clean technologies should lessen demand for fossil fuels and invert the value of these investments, making RBS's decision to press on with funding polluting industries a poor investment decision for the UK taxpayer.

This moment of financial turmoil gives rise to an opportunity to minimise the worst impacts of the climate crisis. The Treasury is legally responsible for ensuring that public money supports the transition to a low-carbon economy, instead of financing climate catastrophe, and UK Financial Instruments has to recognise that there is a clear business case for why exposing the taxpayer to increasing levels of carbon risk doesn't make financial sense.

• Royal Bank of Scotland
• Coal
• Climate change
• Carbon emissions
• Fossil fuels
• Vedanta Resources
• Cairn Energy
• Tullow Oil

Mel Evans
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Large-scale exploration of Earth's biggest gas reserves would release millions of tonnes of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere and threaten local nomadic herders and ecosystems

The Yamal peninsula in Arctic Russia contains the biggest gas reserves on the planet. Their exploitation will release millions of tonnes of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere and, on the peninsula itself, pose a grave threat to the Nenets reindeer herders and their ancient way of life.

Russia's former prime minister Viktor Chernomyrdin recently put the figure at 55 trillion cubic metres of gas. Gazprom, Russia's state energy giant, is more circumspect. But it still says there is nearly 38 trillion cubic metres on the peninsula and in adjacent offshore fields – enough to supply Europe for several decades.

Last month, Russia's prime minister, Vladimir Putin, visited the Arctic Circle town of Salehard with a delegation of executives from leading international energy companies. He invited them to become partners in extracting Yamal's gas reserves and hinted at vast profits from what is now the world's biggest energy project.

Campaigners fear that large-scale gas exploration could ruin the peninsula's delicate Arctic ecology. They also fear that it will squeeze the Nenets' traditional herding routes. Reindeer have already broken legs crossing a new railway line that Gazprom is building across the tundra to its new Bovanenkovo plant. And 160 reindeer herders have already been evicted from their pastures.

Helicopters ferrying gas executives to Bovanenkovo are now a familiar sight, clattering above the Nenets' camps several times a day. Gas deposits were first identified in Yamal during Soviet times. But it is only now that the Russian state has had the resources and technical expertise to develop the fields in one of the most inhospitable places on Earth.

Where there was once tundra – covered in aromatic lavender tea shrubs and the scarlet Arctous plant - there is now concrete and pipelines imported from Japan. Work is going on with three ambitious infrastructure projects – the new 572km railway line due to be completed in September 2010, a gas pipeline, and several bridges.

Nobody expects any of the billions of dollars generated by Yamal's stupendous gas reserves to go to the Nenets. Currently, each reindeer herder receives a meagre 2,000 rouble (£40) subsidy every month. It is enough to buy a single barrel of heating oil during the winter season.

According to Gazprom's information directorate, the company is planning to build housing, kindergartens, hospitals and fish and venison processing factories. But this is little compensation for a people who have survived the upheavals of Russia's traumatic 20th century, including forced collectivisation during Soviet times and economic collapse in the 1990s.

"I want people to be able to lead decent lives, and to be reasonably well off. But at the same time I want to preserve this unique environment," Fyodor Romanenko, a senior scientist from the geography department of Moscow state university, said, summing up the dilemma of nature versus wealth. "Somehow we have to find a balance."

• Gas
• Energy
• Climate change
• Carbon emissions
• Russia
• Fossil fuels
• Oil
• Oil
• Oil and gas companies
• Gas

Luke Harding
guardian.co.uk © Guardian News & Media Limited 2009 | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More Feeds

For 1,000 years the indigenous Nenets people have herded their reindeer along the Yamal peninsula. But their survival in this remote region of north-west Siberia is under serious threat from climate change as Russia's ancient permafrost melts

It is one of the world's last great wildernesses, a 435-mile long peninsula of lakes and squelching tundra stretching deep into the Arctic Ocean. For 1,000 years the indigenous Nenets people have migrated along the Yamal peninsula. In summer they wander northwards, taking their reindeer with them, across a landscape of boggy ponds, rhododendron-like shrubs and wind-blasted birch trees. In winter they return southwards.

But this remote region of north-west Siberia is now under heavy threat from global warming. Traditionally the Nenets travel across the frozen Ob River in November and set up camp in the southern forests around Nadym. These days, though, this annual winter pilgrimage is delayed. Last year the Nenets, together with many thousands of reindeer, had to wait until late December when the ice was finally thick enough to cross.

"Our reindeer were hungry. There wasn't enough pasture," Jakov Japtik, a Nenets reindeer herder, told the Guardian. "The snow is melting sooner, quicker and faster than before. In spring it's difficult for the reindeer to pull the sledges. They get tired," Japtik said, speaking in his camp 25kms from Yar-Sale, the capital of Russia's Arctic Yamal-Nenets district.

Herders say that the peninsula's weather is increasingly unpredictable – with unseasonal snowstorms when the reindeer give birth in May, and milder longer autumns. In winter temperatures used to go down to -50C. Now they are typically -30C, according to Japtik. "Obviously we prefer -30C. But the changes aren't good for the reindeer and ultimately what

is good for the reindeer is good for us," he said, setting off on his sled to round up his itinerant reindeer herd.

Japtik lives on the tundra in a reindeer-skin tent or chum (ital) with his wife, mother, and three-year-old nephew Albert. There is also baby Pasha. The Japtiks live with three other families; the group has around 600 reindeer. The family slaughters a reindeer every couple of weeks, eating it raw and with pasta. They also catch fish – slicing off filets of sushi-like whitefish, taken from the thousands of virgin-lakes across the peninsula.

Here in one of the most remote parts of the planet there are clear signs the environment is under strain. Last year the Nenets arrived at a regular summer camping spot and discovered that half of their lake had disappeared. It had drained away after a landslide. While landslides can occur naturally, scientists say there is unmistakable evidence that Yamal's ancient permafrost is melting. The Nenets report other curious changes - fewer mosquitoes and a puzzling increase in gadflies.

"It's an indication of the global warming process, like the opening of the Arctic waters for shipping this summer," says Vladimir Tchouprov, Greenpeace Russia's energy unit head. The melting of Russia's permafrost could have catastrophic results for the world, Tchouprov says, by releasing billions of tonnes of carbon dioxide and the potent greenhouse gas methane, that was previously trapped in frozen soil.

Russia – the world's biggest country by geographical area - is already warming at one and a half times the rate of other parts of the world. If global temperatures do go up by the 4C many scientists fear, the impact on Russia would be disastrous. Much of Russia's northern region would be turned into impenetrable swamp. Houses in several Arctic towns are already badly subsiding.

Many Russians, however, are sceptical that climate change exists. Others rationalise that it might bring benefits to one of the world's coldest countries, freeing up a melting Arctic for oil and gas exploration, and extending the country's brief growing season. Russia's scientific community seems sceptical of global warming and the Kremlin doesn't appear to regard the issue as a major domestic problem; public awareness of climate change in Russia is lower than in any other European country.

Western politicians, however, point out that it is in Russia's interests to take action on climate change and to push for ambitious targets at December's Copenhagen summit. "There is 5,000 miles of railway track built on permafrost. It could crumble as a result of melting," Ed Miliband, the secretary of state for climate change, pointed out during a recent visit to Moscow.

However, even Russians working in the Arctic are unconvinced that their country faces a serious climate-change problem. "It's rubbish. It's invented. People who spend too long sitting at home have made up climate change," Alexander Chikmaryov, who runs a remote weather station on the Yamal peninsula, said, standing in his dilapidated station strewn with rusting engine parts and a broken-down wind turbine.

Chikmaryov lives in Marresale, an outpost on the Yamal peninsula's north-west coast overlooking the Kara Sea. A small community of Nenets hunters live nearby; otherwise there's nobody for a hundred kilometres. The weather here is, not surprisingly, bitterly cold; the sea freezes nine months of the year. The word Yamal means "end of the world" in Nenets language, and in Marresale you see why.

In fact, Chikmaryov's own data suggests that global warming is a real problem here too. In 2008 the ice was 164cm thick; this year it is 117cm. Winter temperatures have gone up too – from lows of -50C in 1914, when the station was founded, to -40C today. Every year large chunks of the coast on which the station is precariously perched fall into the sea. On the beach there is a jagged layer of thawing permafrost.

And there are other unnatural signs. On 15 August a large polar bear ambled into Marresale and started rooting through the station's rubbish bin. "It was 7pm. The bear was enormous. We set off a flare. It ran off," she recalled. Polar bear sightings are becoming increasingly common – with the bears apparently venturing south from their far-northern habitat in search of food. "They are an impudent lot. They aren't afraid of humans," Ludmilla says, gleefully recalling how one polar bear ripped the scalp from a Russian scientist living on Franz Josef Land.

Back on the tundra Japitik was rounding up his reindeer. Some were already back at the camp; their munching resembled the soft clicking of a thousand knitting needles. "I've lived all of my life in the tundra," he said.

"The reindeer for us are everything – food, transport and accommodation. The only thing I hope is that we will be able to carry on with this life."

• Climate change
• Carbon emissions
• Russia

Luke Harding
guardian.co.uk © Guardian News & Media Limited 2009 | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More Feeds