Climate roadblocks

FOR years, the world has grown increasingly aware of the risks of global warming. Companies, households and governments, you would think, have been stepping up action on “no regrets” measures to improve their energy efficiency, saving money and emissions at the same time.

Not so. The International Energy Agency this week revealed the exact reverse. At least up to 2004, rising awareness that an environmental crisis could be about to hit us had far less impact on the decisions we made than the cattle prod of oil price hikes had in the 1970s and ’80s.
Between 1973 and 1990, the IEA estimates, before climate change really entered political debate, the Western world was increasing its energy efficiency by 2 per cent a year. Yet between 1990 and 2004, with climate change increasingly obvious but energy prices comfortably low, our growth in energy efficiency slowed to 0.9 per cent a year, albeit rising towards the end.

In some areas, we went backwards. In the US, for example, the West’s most inefficient cars in fuel use became even more inefficient as Hummers and other SUVs replaced Chevrolets in American driveways. By 2004, the average new American car had become the symbol of the nation’s obesity, weighing almost two tonnes, and using almost twice as much fuel per kilometre as the average new car in France.

In manufacturing, by contrast, intense global competition helped drive rapid improvements in energy efficiency, especially in the US, Canada, Sweden and Finland.

The Age (Australia)