Bright Blue, the independent think tank for liberal conservatism, responds to the Prime Minister’s new Ten Point Plan for a Green Industrial Revolution.
Phase out of petrol and diesel vehicles
Patrick Hall, senior researcher at Bright Blue, commented:
“The Government’s confirmation of a 2030 phase out date for the sale of new petrol and diesel vehicles is laudable, but the Government desperately needs to take bold measures to reduce the upfront cost of EVs. If we are to support low-income households with the shift to EVs, which have lower running costs, we need to catalyse the second hand market. The key to this lies in the fleet sector, which has a high turnover of vehicles. By shifting central government and local authority fleets to 100% electric as soon as possible, we can expect an influx of EVs into the second hand market by the mid-2020s.”
Zero emissions flights
Patrick Hall, senior researcher at Bright Blue, commented:
“The Government’s commitment to zero emission flight is ambitious. However, there are measures which the Government could be taking right now to reduce emissions emanating in the aviation sector. By bringing recycled carbon fuels into the Renewable Transport Fuels Obligation and increasing the multiplier for the production of sustainable aviation fuel (SAF) above x2, the Government could bolster the production of SAF.”
Home and business energy efficiency
Patrick Hall, senior researcher at Bright Blue, commented:
“The Government is right to seek to improve the energy efficiencies of Britain’s public buildings and draughty housing stock. Homes are a significant source of emissions and one of the sectors that is difficult to decarbonise. Part of the challenge will be in striking the right level of government support for housing retrofits, as well as finding installers to carry out home energy improvements. The Government should consider enabling households to take out government-backed loans for the costs that households will face for retrofitting, over and above financial support offered through the Green Homes Grant Scheme. To address a possible installer shortage, the Government should also provide free training and reduced registration fees for small businesses and local tradespeople to be able to carry out home energy improvements.”
Green finance
Andrew Leming, researcher at Bright Blue, commented:
“In the Government’s new Ten Point Plan for UK climate policy, the Prime Minister has committed to making the City of London a champion for green finance around the world. Although this should already be an important guiding objective for the UK’s public and private financial institutions, the newly announced creation of carbon offset markets runs the risk of inducing complacency within the sector. While it is important that the Government enable financial markets to offset and price carbon emissions in the pursuit of sustainable outcomes, these market mechanisms must not be a substitute for tough, ambitious action by the UK, especially UKEF, to phase out financial support and guarantees for fossil fuel projects.”
Nuclear power
Andrew Leming, researcher at Bright Blue, commented:
“The Prime Minister’s new Ten Point Plan for UK climate policy has committed the Government to the construction of a new generation of small and advanced modular nuclear reactors over the coming years. With the UK currently set to decommission the majority of existing nuclear capacity by 2025, the new proposal is an important step toward securing nuclear power’s contribution to achieving net zero emissions by 2050. However, the Government must be willing to make credible, concrete investment guarantees for investors and corporate partners in seeking to stand up the new nuclear capacity.”
