Date: May 3, 2014

The United Kingdom is one of the international role models when it comes to climate change strategies. It has always been the great promoter of Kyoto Protocol, with its astonishing achievement on GHG emission reduction results, the United Kingdom has outreached its said target on GHG reduction during the first commitment period.

The main climate change law in the United Kingdom is “Climate Change Act 2008.” It is a legislation of compulsory law on a national level, regulating procedures, authorities and organization, substantially authorizing the organizations in charge the authority of detail regulations. Climate Change Act 2008 has set up the reduction target up to 2050, establishing carbon budget system, giving the foundation of the establishment of carbon trade system while including regulations regarding energy and adjustment topics.

Of the organization aspect, the United Kingdom merges the affair of energy and climate change and has established the Department of Energy and Climate Change as the authority department. On top of that, the United Kingdom also set up the organization of “Committee on Climate Change.” The nature of this organization is of a consulting and researching agency while the reports the committee provided have absolute influences. Under the Committee, there is “Adaptation Sub-Committee” with its main focus on adjustment research. The members of Committee on Climate Change have been gathered by experts of various fields including climate science, economy, energy and finance, thus giving the Committee the nature of expertocracy. Researcher Diagee Shaw, panel speaker of the seminar spoken that the government officials of the United Kingdom once said, the secret of the climate change policies of the United Kingdom lies within the reports submitted by the Committee on Climate Change, with professionals in charge in supervising the government instead of making it the parliament’s duty. However, will the expert committee bring doubts in the lack of democracy in expertocracy or the danger of the committee being manipulated whatsoever? Participant speaker Professor Kuei-tien Chou mentioned that even though Taiwanese expertocracy has been criticized with the above issues, however, the United Kingdom is well-known for its traditional democratic self-discipline, experts tend to be trusted by citizens more and could bring its expertise into full play under the circumstance.

In recent years, the focus of the United Kingdom climate change legislation has shifted to adjustment issues. Committee on Climate Change took charge of issues such as climate change risk evaluation and management. The establishment of the Adaptation Sub-Committee has shown the attention given on adjustment issues. The climate change risk evaluation reports and national adjustment projects shall be updated regularly. According to national adjustment projects, the United Kingdom has carried out an overall evaluation of important and fundamental infrastructures. The government is given the right to request climate change adaptability responses from related industries and organizations. The United Kingdom has carried out a system of multi-layers in management and information exchange between central and local governments, government and civil units in consultation and communication. For example, there are consulting conferences for local governments as a mechanism in bringing in an upward information flow for central government in decision making and communication process and further contributing to adjustment strategies that could be tuned up accordingly.

Professor Wen-Chen Shih supplemented on the topics of the financial and economic incentives of the United Kingdom’s climate change mechanism. The United Kingdom has imposed climate change levy on consumers through electronic and gas bills. The revenues were used in establishing a non profit venture “Carbon Trust” as a consulting and technical institute of climate change and it has quite some credibility on international reputation. Professor Shih brought up a interesting information, that if the energy intensive industries signed the climate change agreement with the government, making goals of energy-saving plans, then such industry could reduce levy. The United Kingdom has promoted voluntary carbon emission trade mechanism through policies, targeting carbon reduction while hoping that London could become the international center of carbon finance. In 2006, the carbon trade mechanism that is still operating is the European Union carbon trade mechanism. After 2008, the United Kingdom has legislated the fundamental law of carbon trade and further requested the involvement from public sectors.

All in all, UK’s reduction measures are largely dependent upon economic incentives. The measures of indemnity or methods that are similar to “revenue-neutral” are also involved in encouraging corporates that are voluntary in taking methods or achieving goals. Professor Jiunn-rong Yeh specifically noticed the part of climate change agreement, saying that it conforms with UK’s trend of largely using mass contracts instead of traditional administrative methods in recent years and has shown the nature of climate change: “from government to governance,”  and the possibility of cooperation between public and private sectors. Researcher Daigee Shaw further pointed out the carbon price floor in UK makes manufactures that have not been involved in carbon trade also face the same minimum carbon price. Researcher Shaw pointed out that climate legislation and policies should focus mainly upon using incentives in help forwarding reduction, and that the methods of incentives should be used carefully as it could lead to corporate fraudulence, for example. Professor Kuei-tien Chou commented that while the negotiation between public and private sectors and such agreements as economic incentives are part of the governance, we should still keep an eye on the issues of civilian supervision.