from Sunday Herald, 18 October 2009
Scottish ministers are being warned by their own advisers that major road-building schemes - like the new bridge over the Firth of Forth - are short-sighted, and could crash their targets to cut climate pollution.
The Sustainable Development Commission (SDC), which advises ministers on green policies, is preparing a damning critique of the Scottish government’s transport priorities. To be delivered to ministers next month, it will expose a “significant policy gap” which threatens to derail Scotland’s world-leading climate legislation.
The SDC’s third annual assessment of the Scottish government’s progress towards sustainable development will point out that all the transport measures so far promised by ministers will only deliver half the cuts in carbon emissions needed to meet climate targets.
“Greater alignment between policy objectives based on sustainable development targets and the many transport project decisions made is sorely needed,” says a statement from the commission.
“There is growing evidence for, and acceptance of, this mismatch. We believe the government is in real danger of not delivering the required emission reductions without a root and branch rethink of priorities.”
The SDC’s new UK chair, Will Day, on his first official visit to Scotland last week, accused ministers of a “curious myopia” on transport policy. Building new roads should be a policy of “last resort” not first choice, he argued.
“History shows that if you build a road, it fills up. If you build a bigger road, it fills up too. And if you build a relief road, in a few years you have to build a relief road for the relief road.”
Day, a University of Cambridge academic who replaced Jonathon Porritt as SDC chair in July this year, questioned the analysis that led to a decision to erect a £2 billion road bridge across the Forth.
“We’re going to have to make sure that these kind of major decisions are not made for reasons of short term political expediency but in the long term interests of society,” he told the Sunday Herald.
“Part of what government policy should be doing is discouraging people from using cars for transport. It makes no sense for policy to encourage people to spend more time in their cars.”
According to Day, ‘business as usual’ was no longer an option for transport policy. “We need fundamental, nationwide change, and that means that politicians will have to put their heads above the parapet.”
His critique was reinforced by a new analysis from Friends of the Earth Scotland showing that ministers have missed out millions of tonnes of carbon from their assessment of the pollution impact of new roads proposed in the budget.
Using the government’s own figures, the environmental group suggests that the seven largest road schemes, not including the Forth bridge, could generate 4.24 million tonnes of carbon pollution by 2030 (see table below). The government’s official estimate of the pollution impact of all motorways and trunk roads in the budget is just 213,100 tonnes.
Duncan McLaren, the chief executive of Friends of the Earth Scotland, accused the government of “systematically underestimating” the responsibility of roads for carbon emissions. “Carbon assessment is a useful and welcome tool,” he said, “but when millions of tonnes of greenhouse gases are not properly accounted for, it risks being misleading.”
For the government to ignore substantial emissions from the roads it builds “is rather like a major bank financing a coal fired power station, but disowning all responsibility for the emissions that result,” McLaren argued.
The Scottish government stressed that it took its responsibilities on climate change extremely seriously. Delivering its targets would require the “wholesale adoption” of electric vehicles powered by green energy, said a government spokesman.
“A key aspect of cross-Forth capacity is that future additional travel demand will be provided for on the dedicated public transport corridor. There will also be significant improvements to the design of new connecting roads and junctions to cut down congestion and protect air quality from idling engines in traffic jams.”
Pollution from road schemes
Scheme / carbon dioxide emissions to 2030 (tonnes)
M74 extension / 2,133,000
M80 Stepps to Haggs / 760,000
Aberdeen bypass / 602,000
M8 Bailieston Newhouse / 510,000
M74 Raith interchange / 180,000
A90 Balmedie to Tipperty / 36,000
M8 network improvements / 20,000
total / 4,241,000
source: Friends of the Earth Scotland
Comments