Inevitably, it is inadequate and emphasises growth as much as it does reducing emissions. The last four paragraphs particularly, are very good at putting the strategy in context of the "Big Picture"
This is a key document that we should be lobbying politicians and other key figures on. It would be useful to share thoughts on it.
Clean Growth Strategy includes £2.5bn of investment from 2025-21 in low carbon innovation
The government has published its hotly anticipated Clean Growth Strategy promising deep cuts in CO2 across the UK economy, including a focus on low carbon innovation investment and bringing households up to higher standards on energy efficiency.
The
long-awaited plan was presented to Parliament this morning, following an earlier launch event in London's Olympic Park at which climate change minister Claire Perry declared the world is "seeing a global unstoppable shift towards clean technology solutions".
The policies in the plan put the UK on track to meet the fourth carbon budget, and "reduce significantly" the current shortfall against the fifth carbon budget. However, according to the document, the UK is still on track to miss the fifth carbon budget - which runs from 2028-2032 - by 60 megatonnes of CO2 equivalent. "This shift offers UK business and innovators huge potential to shape the future of clean growth," she said at the event. "By focusing on clean growth we are presented with a win-win."
The interim carbon budget targets are designed to keep the UK on track towards its overarching requirement to cut emissions by 80 per cent by 2050 from 1990 levels.
In a foreword to the strategy document, Prime Minister Theresa May said clean growth was "not an option, but a duty we owe to the next generation" and emphasised that protecting the environment "also benefits our wider economic prosperity".
"This strategy sets out the action we will take to cut emissions, increase efficiency, and help lower the amount consumers and businesses spend on energy across the country," the PM's foreword states. "The government will help British businesses and entrepreneurs to seize the opportunities which the global low carbon economy presents, from electric vehicles to offshore wind."
As widely expected, the plan includes significant focus on cutting greenhouse gases from Britain's built environment, pledging to invest £3.6bn in upgrading around a million homes through the Energy Company Obligation (ECO) scheme. The aim is to upgrade all fuel poor homes to Band C standard for efficiency by 2030, and "as many homes as possible" to this standard by 2035.
There are also measures in the plan aimed at improving energy productivity in the private sector by at least 20 per cent by 2030, including the establishment of an Industrial Energy Efficiency scheme and launching a consultation on raising minimum standards of energy efficiency for rented commercial buildings.
Driving down emissions from heating has long been a desired area for action among green groups, and the plan pledges to phase out the installation of high carbon fossil fuel heating in new and existing homes currently off the gas grid during the 2020s, starting with new homes.
In a boon for carbon capture usage and storage (CCUS) technology proponents, the plan promises to invest £100m in "leading edge CCUS and industrial innovation to drive down costs", and to set up a CCUS Council in partnership with industry to help develop the option of deploying the technology at scale in the UK and to "maximise its industrial opportunity". However, it is still a downgrade to the £1bn worth of CCS funding which was unexpectedly pulled by the government in 2015.
Moreover, the government says it will build and extend heat networks across the country, backed by public funding to 2021 as allocated in the 2015 spending review, and invest around £184m - including two new £10m innovation programmes - in home efficiency and heating technologies.
The UK's nascent ultra low emission vehicles sector is set to benefit from a promised £1bn investment to support the take up of EVs and other low carbon road vehicles, with the government also promising to develop "one of the best electric vehicle charging networks in the world" by investing an additional £80m in charging infrastructure. Funding is also earmarked for low emission taxis and buses, as well as walking and cycling.
And crucially, all government policies towards reducing emissions are to be kept in check by a new Clean Growth Inter-Ministerial Group, which the government plans to reinstate with regular meetings to oversee monitoring of the Strategy and "driving ambitious clean growth policies".
In a statement this morning, Perry also heralded what she said was "an ambitious strategy to cut emissions while keeping costs down for consumers, creating good jobs and growing the economy".
"Clean growth can make a real difference to people's lives, from reducing energy bills and improving air quality, to supporting new technologies and boosting earning power in high-quality jobs," Perry said in a statement.
It follows the
government's announcement yesterday that it will release a further £557m of support for less-established clean energy technologies such as offshire wind as it confirmed the next Contracts for Difference auction would take place in Spring 2019.
The highly anticipated strategy comes nine months after it was promised, having been beset by delays from political events such as last year's EU membership referendum, subsequent Brexit negotiations and June's General Election.
The Clean Growth Strategy is a legal requirement under the Climate Change Act, which mandates the government to set out before Parliament how it will meet its binding carbon budgets, which the UK had been on track to miss in the 2020s.
Pressure had been mounting on the government to raise its ambition in today's plan, as decarbonisation policies outlined before today left the UK well short of what is required to meet the fourth and fifth carbon budgets, covering the periods 2023-2032.
Studies have shown the UK is the fastest decarbonising economy in the EU, having cut its overall emissions by a third while simultaneously seeing its economy grow by around two thirds. However, much of the CO2 reduction so far has been secured by phasing out coal-fired power plants, and as such facilities fall off the UK grid more new policies are needed to ensure continued decarbonisation into the 2020s and beyond.
