20 July 2025 · 20:33
Is climate inaction the new denial?
I respect those wishing to protect nature who are worried about unrestrained infrastructure projects, but the ‘unrestrained’ bit was never part of the plan, and strawman arguments now abound, such as the claim we will be building solar farms on prime arable farmland.
An astonishing 30% of UK land is devoted to grazing, and raised solar arrays can co-exist with grazing, even providing shade during heatwaves. It may even pay back some of the carbon impact of those methane burping ruminants. Solar grazing (or agrivoltaics) is now a thing in some countries so why is it not supported by organisations like the CPRE in the UK?
I have concerns about the impact of progressive weakening of the Government’s new infrastructure policies that may continue the blocking or delaying of essential on-shore renewable energy projects.
In his seminal book over 15 years ago, Professor David Mackay wrote1:
If the British are good at one thing, it’s saying “no.”
No to this solar farm; no to that wind turbine on that hill; no to that wind farm off my coastline; etc.
This, despite the fact that the Government’s most recent public opinion survey2 shows 80% are in favour of renewables; although when it comes to on-shore wind and solar farms in one’s locality, this drops to 37% and 47%, respectively.
Is this because the public are not aware of the benefits of local energy production? Or because not enough of it is community owned? Is it that people do not understand the nature of the emergency we face and the imperative to act?
We’ve seen over the sequence of three heatwaves3 recently (heatwaves that have been made much more likely due to man-made global warming4) that our beloved commons around Stroud now look more like the Serengeti than our green and pleasant land. This will be the new norm by 2050 if we don’t urgently address our emissions.
At this stage in the climate emergency, climate inaction is tantamount to climate denial.
The Climate Change Committee has made it abundantly clear that we need to electrify most of our economy to get to net zero expeditiously and affordably5: This applies to both generation and consumption:
“In many key areas, the best way forward is now clear. Electrification and low-carbon electricity supply make up the largest share of emissions reductions in our pathway, 60% by 2040. Once the market has locked into a decarbonisation solution, it needs to be delivered. The roll-out rates required for the uptake of electric vehicles (EVs), heat pumps, and renewables are similar to those previously achieved for mass-market roll-outs of mobile phones, refrigerators, and internet connections.”
and really at a much lower costs than many have claimed:
“We estimate that the net costs of Net Zero will be around 0.2% of UK GDP per year on average in our pathway, with investment upfront leading to net savings during the Seventh Carbon Budget period. Much of this investment is expected to come from the private sector.”
Much has changed since David Mackay wrote his book. The costs of renewables has dropped, so they are now the cheapest form of energy (and onshore cheaper still).. Yet I believe another kind of “No” has developed in the dialogue around renewables infrastructure.
There has emerged a false dichotomy between green energy infrastructure and nature. The case often presented is that to protect nature we have to limit infrastructure to only those places which no one cares about, like brownfield sites, which of course would completely undermine any attempt to reach the levels of onshore wind and solar that are needed to supplement off shore development. Whereas there are many things harming nature which are much worse including farming systems, tidy gardens, and climate change itself.
Take the rewiring of our electricity grid that is needed for an electrified economy. The case is made for burying cables as opposed to pylons because it is assumed they are environmentally less harmful, and despite the enormous increase in capital costs (and hence delays) that would result. In fact, burying the quite different ultra expensive cables needed in wide trenches can have impacts on flora and fauna, such as harm to tree roots and subsoil ecology, that can exceed those arising from pylons.
Isn’t the honest truth that people simply don’t like their view being changed by the addition of renewables to the landscape and some use the nature card to avoid being labelled NIMBYs? I fear so.
 Rodborough Common 19th Juky 2025 by Richard Erskine
Conversely, we can fail to act and our grandchildren will see a landscape changed forever by our inaction. The MetOffice’s most recent State of The Climate report6 states that under the intermediate pathway scenario (RCP4.5) “years 2022, 2023, and 2024 would likely be considered average by the 2050s and cool by around 2100”. Is that preferable to some wind turbines today offering local energy security and resilience, helping the local community do its part in decarbonising our economy?
The good news is that because of the enormous efficiencies of electrification and the end of burning fossil fuels, the primary energy required from renewables – about 800 TWh per year – would be about one third of the primary energy hitherto required from fossil fuels. Even if we almost double this – to allow for new demands like synthetic meats, AI, minerals recycling, etc – to about 1500 TWh, an Oxford University study7 shows wind and solar can power the UK. As Hannah Ritchie summarises the findings8:
“They think there is a large potential for offshore wind. This would be spread over 10% of the UK’s exclusive economic zone. Onshore wind could be used on 5% of British lands, and combined with farmland. 2% of British land would be used for solar PV, and could also be combined with farmland using a technique called ‘agrivoltaics’. Rooftop solar doesn’t add much – the output is quite small, even if 8% of British rooftops are covered. Definitely still a good option for individuals, but maybe not for the nation as a whole.”
For those that say let others do it, because we are special, don’t be surprised if everyone claims the same. It is analogous to a parent who says let other children take the vaccine (while their child benefits from community immunity so they can avoid the very small risk of side effects of inoculation). If everyone made that choice, everyone is at risk.
Have we, in short, become too selfish to take the steps to act with the urgency needed to actually take declarations of a climate emergency seriously; to go beyond laudable actions like recycling to really substantive endeavours?
We need to make the difficult decisions needed but work hard to take people with us, rather than stoke fears as some political parties choose to. The political debate has created some surprising bedfellows amongst those opposing onshore renewables projects.
Are we Brits just still too good at saying “no”?
© Richard W. Erskine, 2025
References
- David Mackay, Sustainable Energy without the hot air, 2008, withouthotair.com
- DESNZ Public Attitudes Tracker: Headline findings, Spring 2025, UK, Published 3 July 2025, gov.uk
- Heat health alerts come into force as third UK summer heatwave builds, Ben Rich, 9th July 2025, bbc.co.uk
- Explainer: Extreme Weather, Royal Statistical Society, rss.org.uk
- The Seventh Carbon Budget, The Climate Change Committee, 26th February 2025, theccc.org.uk
- State of the UK Climate in 2024, Mike Hendon et al, International Journal of Climatology, Vol. 45, No. S1, July 2025. rmets.onlinelibrary.wiley.com
- Could Britain’s energy demand be met entirely by wind and solar?, Brian O’Callaghan et al, University of Oxford Smith School of Enterprise and the Environment, Working Paper No.23-02, September 2023, ox.ac.uk
- Can solar and wind power Britain? An update of David MacKay’s numbers, Hannah Ritchie, Sustainabilitybynumbers, 30th October 2023. sustainabilitybynumbers.com
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