Written by Les Levidow
Hopes
for decarbonising Britain have recently focused on the Labour Party’s plan for
its next government. In May it promised to issue no new licences for
oil or gas exploration in the North Sea.
In June the Labour Party set out its ‘clean
energy mission’ for
the UK to expand renewable energy, with
‘a clear road map to decarbonisation’, so that the entire economy can ‘accelerate
to net zero’. Is it really such a plan?
Its claims have several grounds for doubt, in particular: that the plan perpetuates fossil sources for the foreseeable future, depends on dubious techno-fixes, perpetuates obstacles to renewable energy substitution, greenwashes a high-carbon future, subordinates the labour movement to high-carbon capital, and so pre-empts a socially just, low-carbon transition. These roles are played in several ways, as outlined here.
Perpetuating
fossil fuels alongside renewable energy
After the
Labour Party announcement, relevant
trade unions criticised its plan for ‘betraying workers’, especially for
lacking a credible plan to provide substitute jobs. Although this criticism is valid, it made the
Labour Party promise
look greener than in reality.
Campaigners protesting against the
new oilfield in Dundee. Photograph: Murdo
MacLeod/The Guardian, 29.06.2023
As eventually
became clear, ‘no new gas or oil’ means no extra licences after the general
election; this plan would allow
the Rosebank and Cambo oil fields to go ahead. As academics
have written, large reserves of oil and gas are already covered by existing
licenses; companies are deciding which ones to develop. Once a company starts using a licence, it
takes three decades to produce new fossil fuels, which may continue for several
decades more. Fossil fuel producers
already have enough licences to generate enormous GHG emissions for the next
half-century and beyond.
The big energy
producers may extend a high-carbon future for several reasons. The current regime has a basic objective to
maximise the economic recovery of oil and gas.
Fossil fuels continue to enjoy state subsidy, and gas prices set the
overall energy price. So cheaper renewable
sources accrue super-profits rather than undermine fossil fuels, especially
within a profit-driven system.
Moreover, total
energy usage will predictably continue to rise.
This trend will be reinforced by the Labour Party’s promise for measures
to increase ‘economic growth’, which generally entails more energy usage. By default, renewable energy may largely
continue to supplement fossil fuels rather than replace them, thus doing little
to reduce GHG emissions.
Alternatively, for
a true decarbonisation plan, a government could limit some fossil fuel source which
are already licensed, alongside new policies to reduce overall energy usage. Likewise it could direct any economic growth
at low-energy forms which incur lighter environmental burdens and bring greater
societal benefit (probably with lower corporate profits). Such alternatives have been promoted under
various concepts such as a ‘well-being economy’ or ‘post-growth economy’. This potential future is pre-empted by the
Labour Party’s plan.
Accepting profit-driven
energy distribution
Last year Keir Starmer
undertook that the next Labour government would create Great British Energy
(GBE), a publicly owned energy company. According to the Party’s energy mission, GBE would be ‘a new,
publicly-owned clean generation company, that will harness the power of
Britain’s sun, wind, and waves to cut energy bills and deliver energy security
for our country’. In early 2023 Ed Miliband floated a proposal for
the government to establish its own assets for generating renewable energy and
so supplying local energy distributors.
Yet simply
producing more renewable energy would be inadequate, for several reasons. The national grid has lacked adequate
investment to promptly incorporate new sources of renewable energy, so
connections face delays of 15 years or more (according to a BBC report). Even as such sources are connected, profit-maximising
firms keep the super-profits from renewable energy rather than pass on the
lower cost to consumers.
To
realize all the societal benefits, it would be necessary to impose an energy price cap geared to renewable
energy, as well as to establish public-interest distribution companies, as advocated
by a CommonWealth
report. Likewise Labour for a Green New Deal
promotes a conference
motion which advocates ‘Democratic public ownership of the whole energy
system, including: Nationalisation of energy transmission and distribution;
energy supply; the UK operations and infrastructure of fossil fuel companies…’
Such a policy
would depend on mobilising mass support against capitalist interests in the
energy sector. Otherwise a profit-driven
high-carbon system will continue, as in the current Labour Party policy.
Relying
on dubious technofixes
When
the Labour Party undertook to issue no more licences for gas or oil, there was
a reassurance: “But Labour would continue to use existing
oil and gas wells over the coming decades and manage them sustainably as we
transform the UK into a clean energy superpower.”
Credit: Cathy Wilcox
How could such
a role be compatible with long-term fossil fuels? It could not be, unless clean energy merely
supplements fossil fuels (as explained above).
Or unless we indulge techno-optimistic fantasies for greenwashing fossil fuels (see CACCTU briefing). Along those lines, the Labour Party mission
would “Invest in carbon capture and storage (CCS), hydrogen, and long-term
energy storage to ensure that there is sufficient zero-emission back-up power
and storage for extended periods without wind or sun, while maintaining a
strategic reserve of backup gas power stations to guarantee security of supply.”
This grandiose mission
implies that CCS eventually would decarbonise natural gas into hydrogen and so provide
a ‘zero-emission’ fuel. The hydrogen
per se might be so at the point of use.
But the promotional language conceals routine methane leakages at the
extraction stage, alongside energy inputs and other difficulties in capturing
the carbon, in order to produce so-called ‘zero-carbon hydrogen’.
Most CCS
projects have failed,
removing no carbon from the atmosphere. They have been most viable as CO₂-Enhanced Oil Recovery, i.e. injecting CO₂ into partially depleted oilfields to
force out more oil, thus undermining the climate objective. Relative to CCS, biological methods are a more
effective means to sequester carbon but are commercially less attractive, offering
no pretext for perpetuating fossil fuels.
The Labour Party
mission also promises ambitious targets for ‘green hydrogen’, i.e.
electrolysing water into its hydrogen and oxygen components. As an energy medium, this lacks credibility
for at least two reasons: The conversion would be much more expensive and energy-intensive
than directly using the renewable electricity necessary to produce it. And the available renewable electricity will have
competing priorities within an overall electrification of energy usage.
All those technologies remain unproven at scale. They provide a deceptive basis to reconcile fossil fuels with decarbonisation and thus to justify delay in real climate action. Nevertheless such technofixes have been promoted by a long-time cross-class alliance between the ‘Energy Unions’ and the fossil fuel industry.
Credit:
‘Trade unions bosses back UK hydrogen jobs boom’, 2020,
The Hydrogen Strategy Now campaign flies the Union Jack,
patriotically allying the ‘Energy Unions’ with energy bosses
Many
workers in the industry remain unconvinced that such fixes can address their
employment needs, according to a 2023 report by Platform and FoE Scotland.
This scepticism indicates the potential for political alliances to organize
around truly low-carbon alternative futures.
Reinforcing energy
bosses’ leadership
The Labour
Party mission invokes an imperative for the UK to compete more effectively in a
global race towards decarbonisation. Keir
Starmer has warned that some nation…”is going to lead the world”, that
“competition is fierce”, that it’s “a race we have to win”. Trade union leaders have reinforced
this narrative in fossil fuel sectors.
As the Greener
Jobs Alliance has cautioned
us, this nationalistic narrative sets up an ‘us vs them’ rivalry with other countries. It obscures
the need for international cooperation to share, improve and supply renewable
energy, especially to replace fossil fuels.
Likewise the narrative pre-empts workers’ solidarity across countries.
The
nationalistic narrative is worse than simply a mistake. Fossil energy companies and trade union
leaders have been jointly promoting dubious decarbonisation technologies, subordinating
workers to their bosses. The Labour
Party reinforces this cross-class political alliance. The Party’s mission
undertakes to stimulate private investment, perhaps through public-private
partnerships, thus extending the neoliberal model. In parallel the Starmer regime has silenced
or eliminated Left-wing voices in the Labour Party, thus demonstrating its
loyalty to capitalist interests.
As a
superficial reassurance, the Labour Party mission undertakes to facilitate ‘a
green just transition’. It aims to
‘Ensure a just transition that addresses regional imbalances and ensures that
no workers or communities are left behind’.
It claims to draw on the “vast experience from across the labour movement
and beyond”.
Yet the Labour
Party mission pre-empts means for the labour
movement to shape its own future. Such
alternatives have been promoted globally by Trade Unions for Energy
Democracy (TUED), such as its programme
for a public-interest, low-carbon energy future. The Labour Party has promised ‘a green just
transition’, yet this accommodates high-carbon capital.
Analogous inconsistencies have arisen around the Labour Party’s London Mayor Sadiq Khan, as shown by Simon Pirani. The Mayor describes himself as a ‘climate activist’, setting targets to reduce London’s GHG emissions, yet his actions have accommodated high-carbon business interests. His last election manifesto promised to establish “a not-for-profit company providing a comprehensive range of energy services”, which could have displaced fossil fuels; yet this promise became reduced to a partnership with Octopus Energy.
He has abandoned the congestion
charge for evening travel. He has accepted high-carbon developments such
as the Silvertown Tunnel. Moreover, his
surveillance agents have spied on environmental activists and excluded them
from public consultation events, thus demonstrating his true role as a climate anti-activist.
Conclusion
Tory politicians and Right-wing newspapers have derided the Labour Party policy as ‘a Just Stop Oil plan’, again making it look greener than the reality. As shown here, its ‘clean energy mission’ is deceptive in several ways: it perpetuates fossil sources for the foreseeable future, depends on dubious techno-fixes, perpetuates obstacles to renewable energy substitution, greenwashes a high-carbon future, subordinates the labour movement to high-carbon capital, and so pre-empts a socially just, low-carbon transition. Among other policies, these will generate mass opposition to the next Labour government.
'We need a green deal right now', demand climate protesters as they disrupt a major education speech by Sir Keir Starmer, Credit: ITV News, 6 July 2023
No worries: The
Labour Party leadership has denounced climate protests that might be effective
and has endorsed
strong criminal penalties. Its next government will retain the Tories’
legislative powers for deterring, repressing and criminalizing protest. No surprise there: Keir Starmer has been
loyally serving the UK security state since long before he became Labour Party
leader. He has been justifiably called ‘a
cop in an expensive suit’, thus an elite role model for his Shadow Cabinet
members and London’s Mayor.
Alongside significant differences between the main political parties, they share a long-term commitment to perpetuate fossil fuels and to protect them through political repression. With this realistic account of the Labour Party, we can better discredit its ‘clean energy’ plan, prepare protest against its next government, and create alliances for an alternative future.
Biographical
note: Les Levidow is a member of the Green Left
within the Green Party of England and Wales. This article draws on general
points from his new book, Beyond Climate Fixes: From
Public Controversy to System Change, https://bristoluniversitypress.co.uk/beyond-climate-fixes
Some points
from the book are summarized in this short article:
“Technofixes or solidaristic commoning? Our
climate strategy must combat the 'technofixes-plus-markets' fraud”, The Ecologist, March 2023,
https://theecologist.org/2023/mar/20/techno-fixs-or-solidaristic-commoning
