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Planning a just future for Scotland Catherine Early meets a member of the Just Transition Commission Scotland’s generous natural resources have enabled it to power ahead on the low-carbon transition, with 76% of energy sourced from renewable technologies in 2018, some 58,000 people employed in the low-carbon sector, and an ambition to reach net-zero emissions by 2045. However, Scotland’s oil and gas industry employs 135,000 people. In 2016, employment in manufacturing, of which energy-intensive industries such as iron and steel, cement and chemicals formed the core, was almost 180,000. How can Scotland ensure that, as its economy moves to become ever lower-carbon, its people are not left behind, or communities hollowed out? That is exactly the question the Scottish government has sought to answer with its creation of the Just Transition Commission, one of the first such bodies in the world. The commission includes representatives from industry, academia, civil society and trade unions. It is holding meetings with different sectors of industry, including transport, oil and gas and infrastructure, and a series of public meetings, to gather views from as wide a range of the economy and society as possible. Charlotte Hartley represents young people on the commission as trustee of the board at 2050 Climate Group, which educates and empowers Scotland’s young people to take action on climate change. She leads the group’s engagement with the oil and gas industry, and also works for Pale Blue Dot Energy, the developer behind the Acorn carbon capture and storage and hydrogen projects in Aberdeenshire. The commission started work in January 2019 and is still at the information-gathering stage. “The only thing we know so far is that we don’t want it to look like the phase-out of the coal industry, because that was quite traumatic,” Hartley says. The commission held a session in Kincardine, a town in the south of Scotland, on the north shore of the Firth of Forth. Two coal-fired power stations had been located in the area – Kincardine, which closed in 1997, and Longannet, which was decommissioned in 2016. The Longannet plant had been the biggest employer in the region, but following its shutdown the largest employer was the Coalfields Regeneration Trust, which employed only 11 people, Hartley says. “There was a consensus across those providing evidence to us that there hadn’t been enough support for the individuals – people hadn’t been upskilled. The operators knew they would be closing the plant, but there was no effort to prepare workers for future careers. That had a knock-on effect on employment opportunities for those people.” At an event held by the commission in September 2019, young people from the oil and gas industry said they could see both opportunities and risks from the transition. While new jobs could be created in the carbon capture and hydrogen sectors, the audience highlighted the difficulties in preparing for a jobs market with no clear idea in which sector future jobs would be available. A strong theme that came out of the meetings with the 2050 Climate Group and the oil and gas employees was the need for young people to be involved in discussion, Hartley said. Catherine Early is chief reporter for The Ecologist. 18 Resurgence & Ecologist January/February 2020
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energy projects, along with new city-level climate commissions. In Yorkshire, the TUC has set up its own Low Carbon Task Force to drive the process forward. To date, the focus of the just transition has been on urgent changes needed in the energy shift. But a similar transformation is needed in terms of food and land use, not just to respond to the climate crisis but also to end the loss of biodiversity and revive rural communities. For Mike Berners-Lee, author of There is No Planet B, “a sustainable food and land system offers a huge net livelihood opportunity”, one that can lead to more jobs with better working conditions. “Unless we get the just transition right, we won’t win the climate battle” Issue 318 Illustrations by Rafael LÓpez www.rafaellopez.com ▶ jobs. Sadly, at UK offshore wind farms, the rate of accidents is about four times higher than in offshore oil and gas, with lower rates of unionisation one explanation. A just transition will also need to be guided by the priorities of place. Geography has determined the location for the world’s carbon-intensive sectors such as coal, oil and gas as well as iron and steel. New green sectors are rarely in the same location. In the UK, carbon emissions peaked in the early 1970s as deindustrialisation got under way, in the process offshoring much of the pollution to developing countries. Decades later, the result has been the creation of the most regionally imbalanced economy in Europe. Not surprisingly, there’s understandable concern in many parts of the country that the drive to zero carbon could simply exacerbate this trend. Avoiding these carbon divisions requires stronger powers at local and regional levels to deliver climate plans that meet their needs, backed up by a more decentralised financial system. Positive signals are coming from the bottom up in terms of community Making these connections between climate, Nature and justice has to become a national endeavour. Scotland has taken the lead, setting up a multi-stakeholder Just Transition Commission to show how a climate-neutral economy can be “fair for all”. A similar initiative is needed at the UK level too, in order to ‘people-proof ’ the strategy to build a zero-carbon economy. A top priority needs to be the Treasury’s policies for tax and spend. Carbon prices, for example, need to be designed in ways that leave low-income households and vulnerable communities better off, and matched by a National Investment Bank to mobilise the capital required. More than this, the just transition could become an essential part of delivering an ambitious outcome at the COP26 climate talks in Glasgow this November. As countries come forward with their new climate targets, these should be accompanied by just transition plans. Some countries are already stepping up, not least South Africa, which is designing an ambitious just transition transaction to pay for phasing down its ailing coal-based power sector and boosting renewables in ways that respect workers and communities, all set against a backdrop of entrenched poverty and high unemployment. Bold approaches to increasing public finance and channelling private capital are going to be essential to make this happen. The stakes are high, according to Fiona Reynolds, chief executive of Principles for Responsible Investment, the US$80 trillion-plus alliance of investors working on environmental and social issues, who argue: “Unless we get the just transition right, we won’t win the climate battle.” Nick Robins is Professor in Practice for Sustainable Finance at the LSE’s Grantham Research Institute. www.lse.ac.uk/GranthamInstitute Resurgence & Ecologist 19

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Planning a just future for Scotland Catherine Early meets a member of the Just Transition Commission

Scotland’s generous natural resources have enabled it to power ahead on the low-carbon transition, with 76% of energy sourced from renewable technologies in 2018, some 58,000 people employed in the low-carbon sector, and an ambition to reach net-zero emissions by 2045.

However, Scotland’s oil and gas industry employs 135,000 people. In 2016, employment in manufacturing, of which energy-intensive industries such as iron and steel, cement and chemicals formed the core, was almost 180,000.

How can Scotland ensure that, as its economy moves to become ever lower-carbon, its people are not left behind, or communities hollowed out? That is exactly the question the Scottish government has sought to answer with its creation of the Just Transition Commission, one of the first such bodies in the world.

The commission includes representatives from industry, academia, civil society and trade unions. It is holding meetings with different sectors of industry, including transport, oil and gas and infrastructure, and a series of public meetings, to gather views from as wide a range of the economy and society as possible.

Charlotte Hartley represents young people on the commission as trustee of the board at 2050 Climate Group, which educates and empowers Scotland’s young people to take action on climate change. She leads the group’s engagement with the oil and gas industry, and also works for Pale Blue Dot Energy, the developer behind the Acorn carbon capture and storage and hydrogen projects in Aberdeenshire.

The commission started work in January 2019 and is still at the information-gathering stage. “The only thing we know so far is that we don’t want it to look like the phase-out of the coal industry, because that was quite traumatic,” Hartley says.

The commission held a session in Kincardine, a town in the south of Scotland, on the north shore of the Firth of Forth. Two coal-fired power stations had been located in the area – Kincardine, which closed in 1997, and Longannet, which was decommissioned in 2016.

The Longannet plant had been the biggest employer in the region, but following its shutdown the largest employer was the Coalfields Regeneration Trust, which employed only 11 people, Hartley says. “There was a consensus across those providing evidence to us that there hadn’t been enough support for the individuals – people hadn’t been upskilled. The operators knew they would be closing the plant, but there was no effort to prepare workers for future careers. That had a knock-on effect on employment opportunities for those people.”

At an event held by the commission in September 2019, young people from the oil and gas industry said they could see both opportunities and risks from the transition. While new jobs could be created in the carbon capture and hydrogen sectors, the audience highlighted the difficulties in preparing for a jobs market with no clear idea in which sector future jobs would be available.

A strong theme that came out of the meetings with the 2050 Climate Group and the oil and gas employees was the need for young people to be involved in discussion, Hartley said.

Catherine Early is chief reporter for The Ecologist.

18 Resurgence & Ecologist

January/February 2020

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