Is UK science and innovation up for the climate challenge?

A new report by Richard Jones and James Wilsdon invites us to question the biomedical bubble - the slow but steady concentration of research and development (R&D) resources in the hands of biomedical science.

A provocative case, it’s already generated some discussion. Here, I want to pick up a point that might be easily missed amongst fights over the role of biomedicine: the all-too-small amount of resource being put towards decarbonising energy.

As the Nesta report points out, we’ve seen changing priorities for UK research over the last 25 years. Defence-related R&D fell by more than half between 1995 and 2015, to 16%. Health-related research was a key beneficiary of this ‘peace dividend’, now accounting for just under a quarter of total expenditure. In contrast, research into energy received only 2.5% of the pot in 2015.

Like Jones and Wilsdon, I don’t want to argue against health R&D. It’s clearly a major priority. But decarbonising our energy system must also be another, especially in the rapidly-closing window of opportunity we have to avoid catastrophic global warming. Tackling climate change is, in all seriousness, the fight of our lives (the word “moonshot” doesn’t cover the half of it).

Of course, dealing with climate change isn’t just about R&D. Indeed, it can feel silly to be talking about how the UK should invest more in low carbon innovation when there is currently a ban on something as basic as onshore wind (a British innovation of the 1880s). There were, for example, some wonderfully warm words from energy minister Claire Perry about the Q-Bot insulation robot at the Parliamentary Sustainable Energy Group conference last week. But it did also feel like a distraction from last month’s Committee on Climate Change report, which criticised the government’s “shocking” lack of action when it comes to simple and low cost options like onshore wind, home insulation and planting trees.

We also need to invest in infrastructure and public engagement with low carbon technology if we’re going to make the transition to those technologies happen, and happen fairly. We should be wary of assuming the private sector is going to be sufficient here, just as we should be wary of assuming it can pick up the bill for innovation, or regulate itself (or that crowdfunding or community energy - though powerful levers for change - are enough).

The rise of electric cars is a good example. Like many low carbon technologies, these may well prove to be unstoppable - to use a term favoured by climate action evangelists - but it’s hard to see how the market acting alone will be anywhere near fast enough, or evenly distributed. Elon Musk fans might be one part of the puzzle, but the shiny innovation fairy - powerful as she is - shouldn’t distract us from any of the other vital work required.

It’s a good time to start worrying about UK R&D though. As Jones and Wilsdon’s timely report emphasises, how we fund UK R&D is about to shift, and with that comes opportunities. Earlier this year, the PM announced the government aims to invest 2.4% of GDP in R&D by 2027, up from its current level of 1.7%. We’ve also seen our cohort of research councils - currently split loosely by discipline into medicine, physics, earth science etc - brought together with Innovate UK into a new larger body, UK Research and Innovation, with a combined budget of more than £6.5 bn. It’s a shift that many people working in universities seem obsessed with - complete with its own parody twitter account - but few people outside the research bubble seem to have noticed.

If you’re interested in UK politics, you should be interested in what we spend on R&D. 2.4% of our economy is no small change. There’s a hackneyed old CP Snow line about scientists having the future in their bones, but the future is far too important to leave to such a small (and, let’s admit it, rather closed) community.

So it surprises me that there isn’t more complaint from the climate movement when it comes to issues like the makeup of the UKRI board. Not only is it dominated by biomedicine, but two of its 16 members - Alice Gast and John Browne - have direct links to the fossil fuel industry. There are some impressive names on that board, but if we’re talking about people with “future in their bones”, I’m not convinced the future they are brewing is a low carbon one.

Maybe in time for the government’s “Green Great Britain” week in October we might hope to see some climate leadership coming out of UKRI?

Alice Bell was a founder member of the Political Science blog. Previously an academic in science communication and policy studies, she is now co-director at 10:10 Climate Action.