The effect of EU carbon emission reductions to national planning policies

1. Laura&Victor The effect of EU carbon emission reductions to national planningpolicies

2. Retail planningpolicieschange • Retail planning policies are in the midst of a major change all over Europe. • Large retail centers, that are often located out of town, have become a cause for concern due to their effects on car-dependency and on the vitality of small town centers. • In the UK the same concern was first raised by the House of Commons in 1985 (Hillier Parker 2004, 20). • The commercial pressure for large Regional Shopping Centres (RSCs) influenced the introduction of planning policy guidance (PPG6) • In Finland the Ministry for Environment has made changes to legislation to better control the large out-of-town centers • Climate change has caused pressure to cut emissions in all industry fields and this also concerns the traffic caused by retail patronage.

3. Finnishpolicies • National sustainabledevelopmentstrategy (Kansallinen kestävän kehityksen strategia (2006) • Strategy of the Ministry of Environment (Ekotehokas yhteiskunta ja hyvinvointia edistävä elinympäristö – Ympäristöministeriön strategia (2002) & Yhdessä kestävään tulevaisuuteen 2020 (2010)) • Reducegreenhousegas emission • LandUse and Building Act

4. LandUse and Building Act • In Finland, the most important legislation controlling land use, spatial planning and construction is the Land Use and Building Act, which came into force in 2000. For controlling retail the most important keystones in the Act are: • The general objectives in land use and planning and the content requirements for plans. (MRL 1§, MRL5§, MRL 39§, MRL 54§) • Parts about sustainable urban structure etc • The national land use objectives, that include principles on the locations of large retail units • Sustainable transport, encouraging public transport and pedestrian and bicycle traffic • planning system, where all the different level plans (regional plan, master plan, detailed plan) have their own function and duties (also regarding large retail units) • particular sections concerning retail: the definition of a large retail unit (MRL 114§), legal effects of a detailed plan (MRL 58.3§ and MRL 58.4§ (came into force 2004)), requirement that a building permit is needed when there is a change of use to a large retail unit (MRL 125.4§) (Ympäristöministeriö 2004)

5. EU • Discourse on ClimateChange • EU Commission: • Transport 2050 • Cutcarbon emissions in transport by 60% by 2050 • ReducingGreenhouseGasEmissionsfromHeavy-DutyVehicles • EU Emissions Trading System (EU ETS) • EU monitored emission levelsfrom 2005-2007 in order to set a baseline and placed emission caps to individualnations with overall EU emissions as the top priority. Countriesthenrequested new emission caps (for 2008-12) based on performance with EU mandatedcaps. In response, the EU againdistributes national emission caps with respect to overallemissions and national caprequestswhichreflects on the cyclical feedback systembetween nation and EU. 

8. Influence between the EUand UK national planningsystem

9. UK • Existing energy efficiency policies (such as the EU Emissions Trading System), the UK implements Carbon Reduction Commitment Energy Efficiency Scheme (CRC) and Climate Change Agreement 2008 (CCA) • help to mitigate CO2 emissions from industrial activities • However, a high number of smaller, less energy-intensive organisations fall outside the remit of these binding policies, yet, collectively, make significant contributions to the UK’s total emissions of greenhouse gases.

10. 2008 UK energy consumption in the industry and service sectors split by fuel and sub-sector (in GWh)

11. Open Questions on reducingemissions in retailing • What is the mostlow-emissionretailstructure for logistics? • Whatabouturbanstructure?