On Thursday 12th October, the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy (BEIS) published their eagerly awaited Clean Growth Strategy to outline how the UK will achieve a low carbon future. Under The Climate Change Act 2008, the UK are legally obliged to reduce carbon emissions by 57% by 2030 (compared to 1990 levels) with the EU also enforcing the UK to cut these levels by 40% in the same period.
Whilst the strategy has been praised by many, a few concerns have been raised by various green industry analysts. In particular, the UK’s fastest growing source of green energy – solar PV – has seemingly been given the least support, favouring other, more expensive technologies such as off-shore wind farms where £550m of subsidy has been pledged to boost wind capacity.
Financial support is also directed to new innovations that provide low cost heating in addition to measures that improve the energy efficiency of existing buildings where the BEIS hope to bring all properties to a minimum energy band C or above by 2035.
Nuclear energy has also been given support, but only if developers can demonstrate that the energy can be provided at competitive prices.
The Clean Growth Strategy report, that quotes ‘a reduction in (UK) emissions by 42% since 1990’, is a positive step forward for the UK who have also been leading the way for reducing global emissions and were influential in creating the COP21 Paris agreement signed by all Nations in 2015.
The UK were successful in meeting the first (2008-12) and second (2013-17) carbon budgets but looking at the carbon budget on page 41 of the report suggests that the fourth (2023-27) and fifth (2028-32) budgets may not be met, prompting many organisations to criticise the plans.
Download the Clean Growth Strategy report here.