A cleaner, greener answer"

But the action that Britain is taking shows it is a false choice between helping the economy or the environment. In Britain, we know that the route to building our economy for the future lies in a sustainable and low-carbon recovery. This shift is central to creating jobs and growth in new industries. During this past week we have put in place many of the measures that will support this long-term move to a low-carbon and green economy.

Our finance minister, Alastair Darling, delivered not only his financial budget for the government, but also the very first carbon budgets. These place a cap on the emissions our country can release over three five-year periods up to 2022, and includes a legally binding target to reduce emissions to at least 34 per cent below 1990 emissions by 2022. This will ensure we can help meet our target of an 80 per cent cut in greenhouse gases on 1990 levels by 2050.

Significantly, we aim to meet the carbon budgets through a focus on domestic action, with the first five-year period to include zero limits on international credits, outside of the EU's emissions trading scheme. And we plan to tighten the budget further, providing we can get the ambitious, global agreement we need at the Copenhagen summit in December.

But targets and frameworks alone will not solve climate change. One of the key issues to our success remains how we can radically accelerate the spread of cleaner technology - good for jobs, the economy and the planet.

This technological breakthrough is needed perhaps most to tackle the toughest issue, namely coal. The future of coal poses the starkest dilemma we face: it is a polluting fuel, but is used across the world because it is low cost and is flexible enough to meet fluctuations in demand for power. To square this circle, last week I outlined to the British Parliament our plans for the biggest demonstration of carbon capture and storage technology in the world. This includes:

A major push on the technology: up to four new projects to demonstrate carbon capture and storage, each one ten times bigger than the largest currently running in the world, and together meaning we are doing more than any other country

The end of unabated coal: I proposed a new rule that no new coal power station will get consent without demonstrating carbon capture from day one, on about 25 per cent of its output. Applications that don't demonstrate carbon capture and storage will be turned down.

And a clear commitment to low-carbon coal once it's proven: There will be an independent judgement about when the technology is proven, and once it is, power stations will have to fit it not just on a part of the plant but on 100 per cent of their output.

Global cooperation on CCS is taking place, but must accelerate this year to ensure the whole world benefits from this technology. The benefits of such technology are not only environmental. There are clear business and job opportunities to be found in green technology, manufacturing and energy supplies.

We have all heard the messages loud and clear: President Obama has committed the US to tackling climate change and cleaning up energy. The G-20 meeting of world leaders, chaired by Prime Minister Gordon Brown, agreed that the recovery of our economy must be sustainable and green.

It is for these reasons I believe the growing international consensus on the shift to low carbon points to hope, not despair. By working together across countries, we can both avoid dangerous climate change and see our economies recover in a sustainable way. This is the right thing to do for present and future generations.

Ed Miliband is the UK Secretary of State for Energy and Climate Change.