Almost impossible to tell what the actual story is from the chipwrapper article, however the entire thing is based on one table in the 68-page report (turn to page 65).
What the report actually says is from a sample basket of 62 UK cities, in terms of CO2 emmissions per capita, Edinburgh is classed as "medium", in that it has average or up to 2% below average per capita emissions and is equal 22nd in that list, with 7.2 tonnes per capita. It is based on 2008 data. The emissions per capita range from a minimum of 4.8 tonnes p/c (Hastings) to 27.4 tonnes p/c (Middlesborough).
These are emissions from all sources. Not just transport.
If you refer to the DECC data from which I think the data for this report is sourced, (slides 25 on) Edinburgh actually comes in a relatively low transport CO2 emmisions category. Perth & Kinross and Stirlingshire would seem to be the key offenders in Scotland in this respect. Interestingly if you look at all cities, they seem to be in the lowest categories. Again this is hardly surprising - the Centre For Cities report itself admits that there's efficiencies in scale for cities, and the bigger they are they generally have lower per capita emmissions.
Domestic emissions are in the 2nd highest category, but there's a striking South & East / North & West differential here that is hardly surprising. The South & East is warmer, has longer days and is drier. It needs less heating and lighting.
Industrial & Commercial Emissions are again strikingly low in the South and East.
If you look at the last slide (29) it says it all. Per km^2 of land area, the emissions effectively mirror the urban conurbations and transport corridors. Again hardly surprising.
SO. Anyway. Back to the point. The centre for cities report itself is ridiculously simplistic and doesn't really tell us much about anything. They've picked one way to measure total emissions, which gives us no insite. The DECC report gives a much more useful presentation of the same data. The EEN article is hardly what you might call anything but a bit of unsubstantiated and pointless rabble-rousing that doesn't really appear to have done it's homework. I'm not sure how far Robin Harper has read into the actualnumbers, but I agree with the sentiments of some of the EEN respondents that he's gone for the "obvious" attack against class and 4x4s, he doesn't (or the journalist doesn't) make it sound like he's done his bedtime reading either.
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