Post: CCC: UK Climate Action “Lagging”

CCC: UK Climate Action “Lagging”

The Committee on Climate Change (CCC) published a report today which warns that despite the new 2050 Net-Zero target, “the UK action to curb greenhouse gas emissions is lagging far behind what is needed, even to meet previous, less stringent, emissions targets.”

Out of the 33 sectors of the UK’s economy assessed by the CCC, including transportation, agriculture and construction, none show good progress when it comes to managing climate risk. “The UK’s credibility on climate change rests on Government’s action over the next 18 months”, said the CCC’s experts.

We’ve summarised a few of the key points within the report, which include improvements to the energy industry and its regulators:  

• Acceleration of sector decarbonisation  – More rapid electrification must be accompanied with greater build rates of low-carbon generation capacity and widespread uptake of  technology to increase energy network flexibility of the energy network and enables greater integration of renewables

• Effective incentive mechanism – “The Government must urgently establish a mechanism to incentivise widespread uptake of near-zero emissions technologies in the industry, including the use of hydrogen, electrification, carbon capture and storage (CCS) and bioenergy carbon capture and storage (BECCS), as well as support for energy and resource efficiency. The design of this mechanism must ensure it does not drive industry overseas, which would not help to reduce global emissions, and be damaging to the UK economy”.

• Innovation in industrial decarbonisation technologies  – Innovation is the essential driving force behind decarbonising the energy network and achieving the Net-Zero 2050 target. This includes investment in solutions that support greater electrification at a lower cost, energy optimisation and efficiencies at all levels of the energy network: generators, transmitters, distributors, suppliers, domestic and I&C energy users.

Below: Committee on Climate Change summary infographic.

For more information on how GridBeyond can help your business to contribute towards the UK’s Net-Zero targets, request a call from one of our friendly team.

Read the full report here.