European Energy Security?
Simon Bond reports on a recent Quaker event
The links between energy security, conflict and climate change were lively subjects of discussion among Friends in York recently at a Quaker Council for European Affairs (QCEA) conference.
You might ask what the subject of European energy security has to do with Quakers. When over eighty Friends met to attend the event at Friargate Meeting House, York, breaking news from Libya provided part of the answer.
Europe’s sources of fossil fuel energy are mostly now past their peak (for example, North Sea oil and gas). This is leading the EU to look for more energy from outside, without increasing dependence on Russian supplies. The need to secure future energy is drawing the EU into dealing with regimes with very unsavoury human rights records, or into conflict zones, in ways that clash with Europe’s own declared values. The case of Libya shows the potential drawbacks!
We heard that QCEA has been engaged in advocacy to the European institutions to link their work on energy security with Europe’s values on fostering human rights and on conflict prevention and peace building.
We also heard, at the conference, from Linda McAvan, Labour MEP for Yorkshire and the Humber, on climate change, the EU and the next international gathering, which will be at Durban later in 2011. Whilst the EU is taking more ambitious steps than some other parts of the world, according to the latest climate science it is not enough, and declarations need to be turned into action. Two interesting facts she told us are that a couple of European countries already get forty per cent of their energy from wind power, and that it is estimated that the Beetle car currently produces the same greenhouse gas emissions as when it was first produced in 1938!
The main deficiency in the EU’s approach to energy is that it focuses on the supply side. It has so far largely ignored the demand side of energy. If some of the money currently going into increasing the supply, with all the risks that entails, went instead into reducing demand through, say, insulation of buildings, we would make a positive contribution to meeting the climate change targets, lessen our dependence on fossil fuels and reduce future costs – a win, win, win solution.
There was a wide range of workshops from Martina Weitsch, Paul Parrish and Rachel Tansey of QCEA, from Laurie Michaelis of Living Witness on the personal as political and living our values and from Geoff Tansey on energy, food and health.
It was also useful to hear tips for effective lobbying – one of the other topics discussed at the event. We came away feeling that Quakers can have a disproportionately large voice on these issues and that we should be letting our lives speak.
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