The SNP has confirmed it will invest £50m in green transport if re-elected.

The proposal was included in the SNP's planned £250m Scottish Futures Fund, which would be funded by savings made from the Forth bridge project.

Speaking in Dundee, SNP leader Alex Salmond said: "Transport is a major source of CO2 gases and accounts for a quarter of Scotland's total emissions. Through the Scottish Futures Fund the SNP will invest £50m in improving connectivity and innovation in transport.

According to the SNP, the fund could potentially encourage the transformation of Scotland's bus fleet into low-carbon vehicles, create bike rental schemes and improve electric vehicle infrastructure.


STV

Research finds benchmarking data encourages interest in energy

DECC published a report  on the results of research undertaken by Ipsos MORI on the potential for including energy consumption benchmarking data on energy bills. Consumer groups had an appetite for benchmarking and providing the data is likely to encourage greater interest in bills and levels of consumption. But the research was limited in its ability to assess the impact of providing benchmarking data on actual consumption.
DECC

Huhne's green print for keeping lights on

Mr Huhne was explicit at the scale of the "Herculean task ahead", but warned of the potential for "costly blackouts" if nothing is done.

"The scale of investment needed to keep the lights on is more than twice the rate of the last decade," he said. "The current electricity market is not be able to meet that challenge."

There is no dispute that Britain's electricity sector needs attention. A quarter of its capacity will be turned off over the coming decade as obsolete power stations shut down and European regulations bite. 

Independent 

Solar industry "perplexed" by exclusion from renewables roadmap

The UK's solar industry has been left "frustrated" and "perplexed" by the government's decision to exclude photovoltaic (PV) technologies from a list of eight renewable energy sources it expects will play a key role in the UK's energy mix through to 2020 and beyond.
DECC's Renewable Energy Roadmap
BusinessGreen.com 

EU Wind Power to Triple by 2020

The European Wind Energy Association (EWEA) says electricity production from wind power will increase from around180TWh in 2010 to 580TWh in 2020, which equates to 16% of total demand. Pure Power: Wind Energy Targets for 2020 and 2030 presented scenarios for onshore and offshore wind power development in the EU and projected that the UK would be able to meet 19% of its domestic electricity demand from wind power by 2020.

EWEA

EU Funding for Energy Efficiency in Public Sector

So implementing energy efficiency measures sounds like a good idea in principle, but how can local authorities or municipalities balance the equation of technology costs and fund the capital expenditure?AltEnergyMag

UK Renewables Roadmap

DECC's UK Renewables Roadmap, sets out a comprehensive programme of targeted, practical actions to tackle the barriers to renewables deployment, enabling the level of renewable energy consumed in the UK to grow in line with our ambitions for 2020 and beyond. This will mean over a four-fold increase in our level of renewable energy consumption by the end of the decade. It identifies eight technologies that have either the greatest potential to help the UK meet the 2020 target.
DECC

The energy market white paper is too vague to encourage funding

Poor clarity in the Government's Paper has led to fundraising doubts. The paper "didn't provide enough details of how the future energy market would operate and had therefore failed to end the uncertainty about the role of renewables and the tariffs they would attract."

Scotland on Sunday

Green Bank to focus on Energy Saving

Potential switch towards providing Green Deal finance rather than investment in large scale renewables is not good news for Scotland's plan to use it for infrastructure investment. Scotland on Sunday