Rt Hon Tony Blair MP Prime Minister 10 Downing Street London SW1A 2AA 7 May 1997

Re: Earth Summit II, The "Atlantic Frontier" And "Sustainable Development"

Many congratulations on your extraordinary victory. As we discussed at our two most recent meetings, you will shortly attend two important international meetings with climate change and sustainable development on the agenda – the G7 meeting and the UN General Assembly Special Session on the Environment in New York (June 23-28).

As I know you accept, new directions and leadership are required if Britain like other nations is to take the path to "sustainable development", and you will go to New York on Britain's record in this respect. I am now writing to you, as I did to your predecessor, to urge you to discontinue the development of the "Atlantic Frontier" proposed oil fields off the north west coast of the United Kingdom.

Greenpeace and other environment groups oppose this development because the world already has more fossil fuel reserves than can be safely burned if the primary objective of the Framework Convention on Climate Change is to be met. Our detailed reasoning is set out in the enclosed report "Putting the Lid on Fossil Fuels: Why the Atlantic Must Remain A Frontier Against Oil Development" by my Deputy Executive Director, Chris Rose. We and others are also concerned about the lack of a proper Environmental Impact Assessment and have filed a complaint with the EC under the Environmental Impact Assessment Directive in this respect. We also believe the UK is failing to implement the Habitats Directive in this area.

The Atlantic Frontier development is a clear and disastrous case of unsustainable development, and one which sends entirely the wrong signal to other nations, both industrial and industrialising.

The development was originally conceived under the last Labour Government. The priorities that pertained then – at a time of oil shock and perceived oil shortage – no longer apply. 'Reserves' have grown rapidly since that time and there is no prospect that they can all be utilised if the world is to meet ecological limits to climate change. The fact that global warming was a certainty was of course not realised until during the Thatcher Administration, and unfortunately no action was taken to prevent further fossil fuel development under either Mrs Thatcher or Mr Major's Premiership.

Greenpeace warmly welcomes the priority that you have signalled for the environment in your manifesto commitments to "put concern for the environment at the heart of policy making, so that it is not an add on extra, but informs the whole of government, from housing and energy policy through to global warming and international agreements".

Your commitment cannot be met if you allow the continued expansion of fossil fuels and development of the Atlantic Frontier. What will you do now?

Your commitment to reduce CO2 emissions 20% on 1990 levels by 2010 is welcome – although we believe it will be relatively ineffective unless it is brought forward to 2005 – but as the slow progress of the Climate Convention negotiations has shown, without controls on the supply side (i.e. a regime to limit fossil fuel production), there is no likelihood that it will be possible to negotiate emissions away within the timescales required to meet ecological limits. This was indeed, the experience with the Montreal Protocol, which controls both emissions and production of ozone depleting substances.

Moreover, we know from many direct talks with the oil industry, that it is not until there is a clear and unequivocal signal from Government that it is giving priority to renewables over fossil fuels, that there will be significant and sufficient investment in modern, safe and clean forms of energy such as solar power.

When my colleague met Gordon Brown earlier this year, we urged that your Government should rigorously promote a UK solar industry. As BP, other companies and ourselves have pointed out, only with UK Government support in the form of fiscal measures and grant aid, for example to home owners, will the sort of progress be made here which is rapidly underway in Japan (the Japanese plan 70,000 solar electric homes by 2005; Britain currently has two!). Our 'solar challenge' document calls on you to divert existing expenditure subsidising fossil fuels in the DTi, to such a solar scheme for 50,000 homes, with 40,000 job creation potential.

We are encouraged by the statements by Robin Cook and yourself, that on the world stage your Government will speak forcefully on the need for action on sustainable development and global environmental protection. Unfortunately I have to say that Mr Gummer, while probably lacking support from his Prime Minister in this respect, was also a rigorous proselytizer but fatally undermined by the outright hypocrisy of British policy in "fast tracking" a huge new oil field, encouraged by massive tax breaks for oil development, while at the same time railing against fossil fuels. Energy and environment policy are, at the heart of Government, in utter contradiction. I assume that you are, like other Heads of Government, personally responsible for 'sustainable development' overall, and would like to know what you will do to resolve this contradiction? You have inherited it but it is also within your power to resolve it.

There are three principal actions Greenpeace would urge you to take:

First to halt all further development on the Atlantic Frontier

Second to give priority to renewables over fossil fuels in all national and foreign policy

Third to initiate and lead the inevitable but overdue process of negotiating a global phase out of fossil fuels, and necessary compensating development of solar, efficiency and other renewables, using the opportunities of the G7, UNGASS and Kyoto to do so.

Greenpeace is aware of the burden you now carry. We and millions of people up and down the country have high hopes that you will transform Britain and put it on a path to development which works with nature, not against it. We also have low expectations – unless you can overcome the force of inertia which keeps British energy policy on the path of 'business as usual'.