UK climate policy ambition under question post-Paris

The UK’s climate policy ambitions have come into question following the global climate deal signed in Paris over the weekend, with green groups calling for tougher targets.

The global deal binds all 195 nations to limiting global warming to “well below” 2 degrees C, which could mean that the UK’s Committee on Climate Change will advise Government to raise ambitions on the country’s current climate commitments.

But according to media reports, Government is unconvinced that policy changes will be needed.

In its fifth carbon budget the CCC urged Government to reduce UK emissions by 57 per cent in the period 2028 to 2032, and by at least 80 percent by 2050. On Monday the CCC said this was based on the least-cost path and on a global ambition of keeping temperature rise close to 2 degrees.

But with the Paris agreement calling for more ambitious targets, the CCC’s recommendations could call for the UK to toughen up further.

“It remains our plan to write to the secretary of state early in 2016 to set out whether [the fifth carbon budget] is affected by the Paris Agreement,” the CCC said on Monday 14 December.

However, it is far from certain that Government will take these opportunities to deepen carbon commitments.

The Financial Times reported on Tuesday that “the government’s private assessment” is that it will not need to make any policy changes post-Paris.

Meanwhile the Telegraph reports that Conservative MPs have already lost their appetite for further ambition.

The newspaper quotes Conservative Environmental Audit Committee member Peter Lilley as saying that the “toothless” global deal means that many countries will fail to take action, while the UK is already committed to ambitious targets.

By June 2016 parliament will vote on the fifth Carbon Budget and legal action could follow if the CCC’s advice is not accepted. 

In addition the government’s ‘carbon plan’ will be agreed by the end of 2016.