Think Tank Library

Is Britain Ready For Carbon Capture and Storage? introduces an innovative technology with worldwide potential for helping to solve our climate change problems. Carbon Capture and Storage (CCS) involves capturing up to 95% of the CO2 emitted from fossil fuel power stations, transporting it via pipeline or container before storing it securely underground in depleted oil or gas fields, coal seams or deep saline aquifers. Globally introduction of this technology could slash emissions by 28-50% by 2050 without which efforts to combat climate change will be significantly more expensive. Until recently the UK led the world in this critical technology.
Yet 2007 saw the loss of Peterhead, a project that would have been the world’s first full scale demonstration plant, and the number of commercial CCS propositions in the UK halved. This report examines exactly what happened and where the UK can go from here if we wish to maintain our lead in developing this technology. In the meantime with several new fossil fuel plants already on the drawing board, the report looks at how to ensure that any plants built before CCS is ready are compatible with it when it comes and so do not lock us into another generation of high emissions.

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Across the political spectrum, politicians have realised that reducing costs to business and putting money back in the hands of consumers is vitally important to help them through the economic crisis. One way of doing this is to reduce the burden of regulations that push up costs for businesses and families. This paper will show that scrapping the expensive and ineffective EU renewables policy would provide a significant and welcome break for British taxpayers.

Sun Microsystems sent a letter to Microsoft on September 15, 1998. It requested that Microsoft “provide complete information” that would enable Sun’s operating system to interoperate with Windows operating systems. Four months later Sun lodged a complaint with the European Commission, which initiated an investigation. The Commission issued a decision on March 24, 2004 which found that Microsoft had abused its dominant position in client operating systems in two ways. First, the Commission found that since October 1998 Microsoft had unlawfully refused to provide certain computer protocols that would enable competing server operating system vendors to interoperate with Microsoft’s Windows client and server operating systems. This abuse focused on server operating systems that perform “work group” tasks and arose out of Sun’s initial complaint. Second, the Commission found that since May 1999 Microsoft had tied Windows Media Player to its Windows client operating system. This abuse arose out of a self-initiated investigation by the Commission. Microsoft made an application to the European Court of First Instance for annulment of the Commission Decision. On September 17, 2007 the Luxembourg-based court rejected all of Microsoft’s grounds for annulling the abuse findings. Microsoft decided not to appeal to the European Court of Justice (the “ECJ”) on October 22, 2007 thereby ending this almost decade-old case.

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Childcare requirements are most intensive during the first three years of a child’s life and these years are the focus of this report. Little Britons assesses research on parental preferences and reviews how State childcare is currently funded, how it supports individual families and its impact on the private and voluntary sectors. The report establishes that present arrangements, although a great improvement on the past, are not flexible enough to meet the needs of today’s varied family structures and working hours.

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Economic theory suggests that refusals to license IP rights are on average benign, and thus presumptively legal, taking into account both long-run and short-run considerations. If, as the US authorities indicated in Xerox, the presumption of legality is quite strong, we show that a Per Se Legality standard should be adopted, as it is then superior in welfare terms to any discriminating standard including EU’s ‘exceptional circumstances’ one (even though Per Se Legality maximizes false acquittals). The scope for reduced costs of decision errors by discriminating standards is not sufficiently large to compensate for negative indirect effects.

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Does a "social VAT" hold the key to the future financing of "social protection"? Judging by a recent report from Eric Besson, France`s secretary of state for public policy prospects and evaluation, the value added tax could reduce labour costs and boost the country`s international competitiveness.

To view the Economic Note click here (English)

To view the Economic Note click here (French)

The "market test" and freedom of choice of insured patients remain the sole criteria to determine if therapeutic categories – on which therapeutic substitution policies are based – are clearly defined and, in addition, if insurance policies based on these categories provide added value in their view. It is worrying to see that these criteria are missing in the context of the legal monopoly of public health insurance systems which are putting in place such policies.

To view the Economic Note click here (English)

To view the Economic Note click here (French).

Anti-trust authorities forget that competition is not measured by the number of competitors but by the absence of such barriers enabling competition to remain vigorous even when there is just one company in a market niche.

To view the Economic Note click here (English)

To view the Economic Note click here (French)

Tax expert Damon Lambert examines the case for EU-wide tax harmonisation, the European Commission’s drive towards it and the UK government’s response. The Commission pursues tax harmonisation with vigour; last year it increased the funding of its two key programmes by 137%. The Commission – despite the lack of evidence that tax harmonisation would benefit the EU and against the wishes of most Member States – seeks undemocratic methods to pursue its tax harmonisation goals, often regardless of the wider consequences.

This is the published version of the inaugural Colin Cramphorn Memorial Lecture, hosted by Policy Exchange. The lecture was given by Peter Clarke, the Head of the Metropolitan Police Counter Terrorism Command, and ranged widely over issues of national security and the fight against terrorism.

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