No, net zero targets didn't cause blackout – nor are they doomed to fail

What would you do if the lights went out, like in Spain and Portugal – if everything closed down? Go for a walk? Go native, and head for the hills, with an air rifle and a Bear Grylls book? Sit at a piano until you’d taught yourself the chord pattern for Werewolves of London?

The day of darkness on the Iberian Peninsula reinforced one thing: we are all wholly, completely and embarrassingly in thrall to technology and, because of that, to the power that drives it. For a brief time, the images and stories coming out of Spain and Portugal were like extra scenes from The Last Of Us. The ghost of Cormac McCarthy was circling for source material for a sequel to The Road. 

In a curious quirk of timing, a couple of interventions came that dealt with the reality the blackouts brought. Tony Blair decided to stick the boot into a drive towards net zero energy production. In a muddled message he said limiting fossil fuels was doomed to fail. He also said that people in rich countries, by which he means places like the UK, did not want to make financial sacrifices when they knew their impact on global emissions was “minimal”. Within a few hours his organisation, Tony Blair Institute, clarified and said he backed the UK’s net zero target. So that’s all fine then.

There is no evidence that a net zero target, or attempt to grow use of renewables, was a contributing factor to the Spanish collapse. That didn’t stop theories online, and some newspaper columns, suggesting it was involved.

And when somebody like Blair then puts his position as he did, he serves not to show he’s attuned to everyday realities, but adds grist to the mill that makes any attempt to deal with the reality of climate change, and the need to find alternative power sources, a class issue – the hoity-toity middle class pushing their agenda down on the working-class. Then this is bundled into the culture wars, and we’re off at the gallops.

A focus on alternative, UK-created, sustainable energy sources has come in the wake of the Russian invasion of Ukraine, which increased domestic prices, as every person knows, and illustrated how vulnerable the country is to uncontrollable global vicissitudes.  

Blair will know there is no chance of coal mines being reopened and new coal-fired power stations being built. Neither is there a chance of loads more oil refineries being constructed in Britain. In fact, on the day before he spoke, Grangemouth, the 100 -year-old refinery on the Firth of Forth, stopped refining crude oil for the final time. This came too early for 430 people to feel the good of a just transition to renewable jobs, as they lost theirs.

But it is a reality that Blair seems to be sidestepping. Therefore, the answer has to be found elsewhere – renewables, including nuclear, has to be part of this. Obviously fossil fuel use will have to remain to sustain things as this change is delivered, but to casually slate it as doomed to fail is bizarrely tin-eared. 

The other side of that – that rich nations make little difference – is also one of those received arguments that is anchored in the idea of don’t bother doing anything because China is massively polluting, that they don’t care and they’re building coal-fired power stations at a massive rate to drive their economic charge. The numbers just don’t back that up.

• Tony Blair is talking nonsense on net zero. The reality is the UK isn’t prepared
• 40C heatwaves are now reality. It’s time to transform our cities
• Four reasons why net zero is a solution – not a problem – for the energy crisis

China is becoming a clean-energy superpower. The clean-energy sector drove a quarter of the GDP growth in China in 2024. That’s around $1.9 trillion. In fact, according to Carbon Brief, the amount China put into clean energy was around the same as the global total in fossil fuels. They aren’t messing around.

At the same time as the energy hoohah, a Treasury Committee report, looking at the cashless society we find ourselves in, said that in future there may need to legislate to force some shops and businesses to accept cash.

As the Spanish blackout showed, in some instances cash is essential. Big Issue is a business that has relied on cash since its inception. We have spent a lot of time helping our vendor colleagues become ready for a cashless society. This involves more than simply providing card-readers, or increasingly, phones. There is frequently a lot needing to go on to help them get ID and anything else necessary to be banked. This helps build scaffold to be ready for life as it is now.

And there remains a place for cash. It’s positive to want to make sure people can use it. Everybody isn’t cashless yet – both our colleagues and customers. But Blair’s intervention and the cash legislation both felt like a request to breed more horses as a way to stop the rise of the internal combustion engine. The horses have bolted. We need to make sure we’re prepared for the future, to make sure our energy needs, the national grid capabilities, are met. 

Though probably wise to keep a couple of pounds in our pockets.

Paul McNamee is editor of the Big Issue. Read more of his columns here. Follow him on X.

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