The water sector has set a target of 2030 to reach net zero but as Yorkshire Water chief executive Liz Barber tells Utility Week the regulator has yet to catch up. As part of our Countdown to COP campaign, she also defends offsetting as a valuable tool in achieving net zero, if it is properly executed.

COP26

What do you want to hear from the conference?

I’d really like to see global recognition of the size of the issue and a real will from global leaders to get to net zero. There is still too much playing around with the numbers at the moment, but COP26 has the potential to be a tipping point for global policy.

Has the UK done enough this year to position itself as a world leader on climate change?

I think COP26 will show whether the UK really is a world leader on climate change – the policies and investment made by our politicians following the conference will determine whether we mean it or not.

Walking the talk

When is your company planning to get to net zero?

We, along with other water companies across the UK, have set the ambitious target of becoming carbon net zero by 2030. Our carbon strategy focuses on ways that we can reduce our emissions by adopting new ways of working and increasing our use of green fuel sources, as well as plans to manage our land to store carbon, through initiatives such as peatland restoration and tree planting schemes.”

To what extent should utilities look to offset emissions as opposed to focusing on achieving zero carbon?

There is merit to both strategies – we have decided to take a hybrid approach, which focuses on reducing carbon as much as possible and using land based solutions to offset the emissions that are not feasible to reduce to zero.

Customers and the community

What role do you think utilities have in helping to accelerate the climate plans of local authorities?

There are a number of opportunities for us to work together with local authorities. For example, we’re working to make all our cars and vans electric by 2030, but to enable that we’ll need to work with others, including local authorities and other utility companies, to ensure that there is charging infrastructure in place to allow us to operate, especially in more rural parts of the region.

As our net zero target is closer than those of most local authorities, we’ve also been working with local authorities to share our experiences and learnings around reducing emissions.

As a big landowner we also have a role in bringing other landowners together to look at the role that land can play in addressing the climate emergency. We established the Yorkshire Land Network (YLN) which brings together Yorkshire’s biggest landowners to help support the delivery of nature-based solutions to climate change. We hope that the YLN will help connect big landowners with organisations looking to offset their emissions, helping to direct funding towards projects here in Yorkshire.

We’re also heavily involved with the Yorkshire and Humber Climate Commission. It brings together key people from the public, private and third sector to support and guide climate change actions across the region. We recently announced that we will be publishing a hugely ambitious 50-point action plan for the region, to coincide with COP26.”

Policy & regulation

What is your principle ask of government and the regulator to help your company contribute to the net-zero push?

We’d like to see regulation change to allow more nature-based solutions, which will be key to reducing and offsetting emissions. Currently regulation favours hard engineering as those solutions are usually quicker to deliver and have more certain outcomes, so it would be good to see more flexible regulatory framework that would allow us to take alternative approaches without being penalised. The government could help to direct this through its strategic policy statement to Ofwat.

Ofwat have indicated that their cost assessments will be based on a 2050 net zero trajectory, rather than 2030. That would mean water companies aren’t funded to deliver by their target of 2030. We’d like to see Ofwat prioritise the net zero challenge and for them to support companies in tackling it.