Question to the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy:

To ask the Secretary of State for Energy and Climate Change, what assessment she has made of the effects of ending funding for Carbon Capture Storage on employment and carbon reduction targets in (a) the North West and (b) the UK.

The UK met the first carbon budget and is on track to meet the second and third carbon budgets for 2013-17 and 2018-2022, respectively. We will set out policies and proposals for meeting the fourth and fifth carbon budgets at the end of 2016, after setting the fifth carbon budget level by 30 June.

The Government’s most recently published Energy and Emissions Projections can be found at:

https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/updated-energy-and-emissions-projections-2015 (Annex J)

The Office for National Statistics estimates in its report on the Low Carbon and Renewable Energy Economy that 96,510 businesses were active in the UK’s low carbon and renewable energy sector in 2014 and accounted for an estimated:

• 233,000 full-time equivalent employees
• £45.3 billion turnover; £4.8billion in exports; and £5.9 billion imports
• £8.8 billion in acquisitions and £0.5billion in disposals of capital assets

The full report is available at:

http://www.ons.gov.uk/ons/dcp171776_426448.pdf.