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Johnson's new Net Zero plan redraws the lines of the climate debate.
Some doubt if Boris Johnson's proclaimed passion for prioritising climate action will survive once the global spotlight moves on after the UK-hosted COP26 summit next month. The publication of his Net Zero strategy today will surely prompt a re-assessment of this view. It sends a clear signal of his intent to double-down on the green agenda in the run up to the next general election.
The direction of travel is set, increasingly irreversible, and reflects the strength of public support as well as international momentum from other big economies like the US and EU.
Britain is the first country in the world to set a target to end the sale of fossil-fuelled heating systems by 2035. The Treasury will embark on energy tax reforms to help facilitate this goal, while making substantial grants available so some households can shift to heat pumps and prime the market for everyone else. Ministers are hedging that this package will kick-start enough of a market for clean heating technology that Octopus Energy and other energy companies can make good on their promised cost reductions, ensuring clean heating becomes affordable and accessible to all.
The target to end the sale of petrol and diesel cars in nine years time will now be underpinned by new mandated requirements on car-makers for the production of electric vehicles, which should drive down upfront costs for the consumer and incentivise companies to invest in new factories in the UK. This so-called zero-emission vehicle (ZEV) mandate follows years of campaigning by groups like Green Alliance and a coalition of businesses, backed up by in-depth analytical research on how this policy could work by Policy Exchange and Vivid Economics. In carbon-cutting terms, this may be today's most significant announcement.
A new target for greening power supplies by 2035 (something ruled out during David Cameron’s years) will now accompany the largest ever investment auction in renewables as well as a greater role for the state in delivering new nuclear power stations. This matches the target adopted by Biden in the US and Trudeau in Canada, and meets the Committee on Climate Change’s recommendation for what's needed from the power sector in order to be on track for Net Zero by 2050.
Two new Carbon Capture & Storage (CCS) projects are at last moving forward to help heavy industry slash emissions, and the government has more than doubled the overall level of carbon capture it is targeting by 2030. And, in recognition of the need for negative emissions technology, there's a welcome new boost for research on and development of Direct Air Capture technology, something many experts would consider a more credible option for balancing residue emissions than an over-reliance on unsustainable levels of bioenergy with CCS (BECCS).
On rules for big businesses, some of the biggest corporations will now be required to publish Net Zero transition plans. Although it's unclear if these rules will have teeth, they should nevertheless bring a new level of scrutiny to what the largest firms are doing to align their practises with the Net Zero goal and could pave the way for future regulation if they don't clean up their act.
Now climate battle-lines will likely be drawn on levels of investment, technology choices, how we use our land, and what post-Brexit trade deals could mean for the transition as a whole.
On levels of investment, campaigners and opposition parties will rightly focus on the continued shortfall in the overall envelope for public money for carbon-cutting delivery relative to what the OBR and Committee on Climate Change propose we need. The sum announced for home insulation today is billions short of Boris Johnson's promise in his own manifesto. Overall, the figures don't come close to the scale of funding Labour say they would put forward, which tees up a familiar debate on the size of the state relative to the role of the private sector, particularly in relation to insulating buildings and skilling-up the workforce. But this row will also play out within the Tory party itself between the fiscal hawks and the "Brexity Hezzas" who believe more investment is needed for "levelling up."
On technology choices, scientists have cast doubt over some of the carbon-cutting options under consideration in the name of delivering Net Zero, like bioenergy and gas-based hydrogen, warning they could actually raise rather than lower emissions.
Ministers are considering investing billions through raised energy bills to fund bioenergy-based power, even though Drax’s plant may already be the biggest source of pollution in the country. Chatham House considers the environmental impact of burning biomass for power to be comparable to coal, and yet it is currently treated by the government as “zero-carbon” and therefore doesn't even pay the carbon tax that other power generators do. Instead its electricity dubiously counts towards the government’s climate targets.
Similarly, scientists have raised the alarm over some forms of hydrogen, which could turn out to be based on polluting fossil fuels rather than being truly green. It is striking how distinctly cool today's language is in this part of the strategy (“the government will take a decision on hydrogen’s role in heating homes by 2026”), suggesting that more space is opening up for debate about the integrity of different choices.
Perhaps the weakest parts of today's Net Zero strategy are those focussed on land use and agriculture. Unlike power, heat, and transport, farming does not have a target or roadmap for cutting emissions, and the grouse moor lobby will be allowed to continue burning peatlands, our biggest natural carbon store. All this is no doubt a reflection of the difficult politics of climate in the countryside.
Finally, a big question mark hangs over the influence of new trade agreements, after a series of leaked documents brought into focus the risks they could pose to the UK’s climate ambitions as a whole.
We will have to wait for the Committee on Climate Change’s final verdict on the package to see to what extent the PM's plan puts us on track to achieve our targets for the decade ahead and Net Zero by 2050 (the government claims that it will on page 18) but the new strategy certainly represents meaningful progress and redraws the lines of the debate for the years to come.
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