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Utility company Scottish Power has been named as the UK's most environmentally-friendly power firm by charity WWF.

The charity places the business top out of the six largest power companies in the UK in terms of levels of greenhouse gas emissions, energy efficiency and renewable energy capability.

But while Scottish Power was praised for its overall efforts to respond to climate change challenges, EDF Energy and Centrica, the parent company of British Gas, were both criticised for failing to address pressing climate issues, ahead of the imminent publication of the government's energy review.

The country's largest integrated energy firm, E.ON UK, finished behind Scottish Power in the environmentally-friendly stakes, while Scottish and Southern Energy and RWE npower were third and fourth respectively.

Matthew Davis, climate change campaign director at WWF UK, said: "Scottish Power deserves praise for doing the most overall to adapt their business to the challenge of climate change.

"However, this report shows that overall the power sector is doing little beyond trying to meet government targets - many of which are not tough enough to justify the government's self-styled international leadership on climate change."

Mr Davis explained that EDF Energy's poor performance and placing at the foot of the table may be due to its distraction at trying to convince the government to turn to a new generation of nuclear power stations.

WWF claims that carbon dioxide emissions have increased by 15 per cent since 1997, with 48.6 million tonnes being emitted in 2005 alone.

Keith Allot, head of WWF UK's climate change programme, said: "The government needs to provide the incentives to put UK power companies on a low carbon path."