Climate Change: Net Zero Strategy

Lord Lennie Excerpts

Wednesday 3rd May 2023 Lords Chamber

[Lord Callanan (Con)]

My noble friend makes an important point. I know he has a lot of experience in this area and he is right to point out the scale of the task. It is an immense challenge to be done over many years; none of this happens overnight. Some of the wind farms that are coming on stream this year were planned a decade ago; it all takes time to do, but over the next 20 or 30 years we need to make progress towards those goals. They are legally binding, so we need to meet them and we are on track to do so.

[Lord Lennie (Lab)]

My Lords, following the Minister’s answer to the noble Baroness, Lady Jones, the Government are currently way off track to meet their sixth carbon budget for 2033 to 2037. This is a crucial period once the low-hanging fruit has all been picked. What additional measures are the Government considering to ensure that the harder to abate sectors deliver the necessary reductions in large-scale emissions in order to ensure we meet our net-zero targets?

[Lord Callanan (Con)]

The sixth carbon budget goes through to 2038. We have set out policies to meet— I think—about 97% of the targets under that and we have a number of other policies that are so far unquantified. In essence, the noble Lord is right, of course. As we make faster progress—and we are making very swift progress—the targets become more difficult to meet: but I am confident that we can do so.