Rochdale carbon footprint

Date published: 19 September 2007

Rochdale is doing well compared with most Greater Manchester authorities in achieving the Liberal Democrats’ dream of a carbon-neutral society.

The average resident in Rochdale is responsible for pumping out 2.5 tonnes of carbon dioxide every year, the average households in Wigan, Tameside and Bury emit 2.4 tonnes and Bolton, Salford as Rochdale, emit 2.5 tonnes.

Nieghbouring Oldham and Manchester emit at 2.6 tonnes and Stockport and Trafford are recorded as pumping out 2.7 tonnes.

The figures, calculated for the Department for the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra), were highlighted as Liberal Democrat delegates backed ambitious plans to make the UK carbon neutral by 2050.

The package — which the party insists is the only serious attempt to tackle global warming — would ban all petrol powered cars by 2040.

As well as hiking tax on gas-guzzling cars and charging lorries to use roads to double rail investment, it would also introduce green mortgages to improve their energy efficiency.

The data was calculated from local electricity and gas meter readings and sales data, to measure energy use at the point of consumption, rather than generation.

Gas and electricity combustion, together with road transport, are, according to Defra, responsible for 80 per cent of energy use in the UK.

Chris Huhne, the party’s environment spokesman, said urgent action was needed, because three-quarter of homes likely to be in use in 2050 were already built.

He highlighted how the average Swedish energy bill was £385 lower than in Britain — despite January temperatures being seven degrees Celsius lower.

Mr Huhne said: "At the moment, we might as well be standing outside our front doors, burning £50 notes.

"We still have to make that leap. We have to summon up the courage. What sort of people are we if we value our own instant pleasure more than our children and their futures on this planet.

"With these plans we can restructure the economy towards a basis that is based on renewable energy not on fossil fuels."