GREENPEACE WELCOMES BLAIR'S GREEN SUMMIT AND URGES URGENT G8 ACTION ON RENEWABLE ENERGY

GREENPEACE WELCOMES BLAIR'S GREEN SUMMIT AND URGES URGENT G8 ACTION ON RENEWABLE ENERGY 4 December 1997 Greenpeace welcomes the initiative taken by Tony Blair in hosting today's Green Summit at Downing Street and urges him to begin urgent global action to catalyse the rapid expansion of the global renewable energy industry to combat global climate change. Greenpeace calls on the Prime Minister to follow up this initiative and put in place a regulatory and budgetary framework to create a strong renewable manufacturing industry and significant new jobs for Britain. Also, as outlined to Tony Blair in a letter from Greenpeace last month, the UK should use the opportunity provided by its position as host of the G8 meeting next year, to bring together 'leaders from business, finance, technology and governments concerned with renewable energy, to develop new markets and partnerships' for renewable technologies. Chris Rose, Deputy Executive Director of Greenpeace said;'As host of next year's G8 Summit Tony Blair should follow today's meeting with urgent global action for a massive expansion of renewables to combat the threat of climate change and create new jobs.' Last week the European Commission approved a White Paper on Renewables which will mean that 12% of Europe's energy will be met by renewable energy such as solar and off-shore wind energy. This initiative alone will generate up to a million new jobs and create a £10 billion a year export market for renewables. Notes 1. The Green Summit hosted by Tony Blair at Downing Street today brought together 5 Cabinet Ministers as well as representatives from business including Shell and BP. 2. In contrast to Britain where only a 1,000 people are employed in the wind industry the Danish wind turbine industry already employs 10,000 people. Globally, the solar industry employs around 10,000 people with about 300 in the UK. 3. BP and Shell do not have solar manufacturing facilities in the UK. BP has solar factories in Spain, Australia and the US. Shell has announced they will build the world's largest solar factory in Germany. For Further Information
Contact Greenpeace Press Office on 0171 865 8255/6/7/8