by Will Jones
The Climate Change Committee, the UK’s official Net Zero advisory body, has told the Government that to hit Net Zero it must impose radical lifestyle changes on the UK population. The Mail has more.
The UK’s drive for Net Zero means millions of Brits face having to install heat pumps in their homes over the next decade, according to the Government’s climate advisers.
The Climate Change Committee said there needed to be around 1.5 million heat pump installations a year in existing homes by 2035 – up from just 60,000 in 2023.
In its [advice on the UK’s] Seventh Carbon Budget, which sets a limit for UK greenhouse gas emissions between 2038 to 2042, the committee also piled pressure on Brits to buy electric cars, fly less and cut their meat and dairy consumption.
The report said, in order to meet the country’s Net Zero ambition, three-quarters of cars and vans and two-thirds of heavy good vehicles (HGVs) would need to be electric by 2040.
At the same time, Brits should be shunning their cars to cycle and walk more, while eating 25% less meat, the committee stated.
Holidaymakers were warned of more expensive flights as the committee urged the Government to commit to a 17% fall in aviation emissions compared to 2023.
Demand for air travel needed to be managed to curb emissions, with airlines taking responsibility for the costs of decarbonising through sustainable fuels, capturing carbon and electric and hybrid planes, the committee said. [All of which are, being generous, unproven technology.]
That would push up costs, for example increasing the price of a return ticket to Alicante, Spain, by £150 and a round-trip to New York could be £300 more expensive by 2050, according to the report.
Critics of Net Zero policies condemned the report as the committee’s “usual Marxist garbage” and urged Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer to “face down the zealots” as his Labour administration scrambles for economic growth.
The Government is committed to reaching Net Zero – which means reducing greenhouse gas emissions by 100% from 1990 levels – by 2050.
Under the committee’s “balanced pathway” for reaching this target, the report found achieving Net Zero would cost around £110 billion over the next 25 years.
At an average of £4 billion per year between 2025 and 2050, this translates to around 0.2% of GDP.
This was estimated to be front-loaded into the first half of the period, peaking at annual net cost of £33 billion in 2029.
For the period between 2025 and 2040, the committee’s figures showed the drive to Net Zero would cost an eye-watering £320 billion.
But the report added, from 2040, the annual net cost would become a saving due to falling technology costs and more efficient use of energy and resources. [Jam tomorrow.]
This would lead to a net saving of around £35 billion in 2050, it said.
In its latest advice, the committee urged the Government to commit to an 87% cut on the UK’s 1990 levels of greenhouse gas emissions by 2040.
It set out what it said was a deliverable and cost-effective route to the greenhouse gas emissions cuts required from 2038 to 2042 to ensure the UK meets Net Zero by 2050.
Around a third of the emissions cuts in the period will have to come from action by households, mainly buying an electric car and a heat pump to replace an old gas boiler.
But personal choices on eating less meat and dairy, and flying, would play a “smaller, but important role”, the committee added.
To cut emissions from meat and dairy production – and free up land for tree planting to absorb carbon – Brits were told they would have to eat 25% less meat by 2040 compared with 2019 levels.
Worth reading in full.
The Climate Change Committee was created by the Climate Change Act 2008 to give the Government independent advice on how to achieve its climate goals. The Government is obliged under the act to create legally binding carbon budgets for each five year period up to 2050 to ensure it is on track. The Government doesn’t have to accept the committee’s advice – though to date it invariably has – but it does have to set a binding carbon budget (this will be the seventh, for 2038-2042) that keeps the country on target. Without repealing or amending the act the Government has very little wiggle room, so it’s worth looking out for what it actually comes up with in the next year or so. We shouldn’t expect it to be much different to what the committee has suggested, though. The point of the committee, after all, is to do the donkey work in figuring it all out. How this fits with ‘going for growth’, though, is anybody’s guess.
Stop Press: BP has announced it will cut its renewable energy investments by more than $5 billion (£3.9 billion) a year and instead focus on increasing oil and gas production, boosting its investments there by about 20% to $10 billion (£7.9 billion) a year.
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Labour can’t be kicked out for 5 years. And yet its cure for climate change is going to cause significant disruptions and pain in the UK economy. That sets up a big confrontation between hope and reality. Surely Labour has to start walking back some of those promises, starting soon? Or is this a Kampuchea situation, where the true believers are prepared to destroy a country to save it?
Or a Sri Lanka situation, going to pitchforks and torches?
Welcome to the Parliamentary dictatorship.
One of the presumed advantages of US federalism is that the Peoples of the individual States can push back if the Federal government becomes abusive of their liberties. Our beloved Left, of course, has historically opposed this concept, given their top-down approach to achieving their goals. However, with the election of Trump, along with Republican majorities in both houses of Congress, we are now witnessing a very noticeable surge in ‘States Rights’ within the ranks of blue-state Democrat Jacobins, many of whom are now channeling John C. Calhoun.
Nothing could be much worse than the illusion of democracy in Britain.
It’s a very sick mediaeval joke. Feudalism never really went away.
Yep, it’s just arguably worse. Instead of a feudal lord that cares about what goes on with his lands, we have a clique of Eton old boys that don’t care about much outside of W1.
Not so much “Parliamentary dictatorship” More political party dictatorship. Without parties Parliament would be a true democracy.
What about a full on revolution? Will that work?
And who controls the means of violence?
Yes. That will work. Vote independents not parties and you will have your peoples revolution. No violence needed. Just commonsense.
“Vote independents not parties and you will have your peoples revolution.”
I’m afraid we won’t. What we would have would be 650 individual elected MP’s who would immediately disagree with one another about everything, including how they were to conduct themselves as MPs in Parliament, so they would be completely unable to take any settled decisions about anything and the chaos would be total and irreducible. In effect it would be as if we had 650 political parties operating in Parliament instead of the handful that we currently have and the result would be endless Pandemonium, not democracy.
Too late for the poor saps in Luton.
“The report said, in order to meet the country’s Net Zero ambition,…”
Stupid ambition and relevant to nothing.
Net Zero is pure insanity! And UK politicians can’t see it. They continue along like they know what they are doing.
One of these days, UK politicians are going to look around and realize the rest of the world has left them behind, and they are the only ones bankrupting themselves over CO2 reduction.
And all this for absolutely no measurable change in the UK climate nor any climate anywhere on earth. Have these people no minds at all? They are proposing the utter destruction of an ancient land for nothing whatever but a virtue signal.
The adoption of Net Zero policy was not done using reason and logic. It was done strictly through emotion. Reason, logic and facts cannot help those who have none. Only the harsh lessons imposed by reality can stop them now. … at great cost to the hoi polloi, who are powerless to stop them short of physical revolution.
You could add vote gathering to that list. The madness, promoted through fear was a useful tool to help win the election.
What an excellent blackout strategy!
Reality hasn’t quite bitten yet
Pass the Carbon neutral popcorn!
You poor, suffering Brits-you need a new Gunpowder Plot…or a Trump-type of leader because you are soooo screwed by your Gov. But if you want to continue your downward fall, maybe we could sent you some Democrats.
Hopefully Trump will invade us here in the UK , we won’t put up any fight
1776 is way better than the 7th century they have in mind.
I don’t know if that’s a good idea. I’ve seen how you all vote…
Even if acknowledged Biden was “elected”, that was under extreme duress, an enormous media plot, and the deep state all working in conjunction to subvert any possibility of fairness.
There was one good thing about the Biden period…
It set up the USA for Trump 47 and hopefully, the total cleansing of the US government.
Labour’s vote share fell dramatically in the last election. They only got their apparent landslide because the opposition vote was split; the vote was against the Tories rather than for labour. Labour has a razor thin margin in many constituencies. If Starmer continues cocking up, his replacement by rayner will be guaranteed. Demand for a new election at that point is inevitable, leading to a no confidence vote if it’s refused, and that will see labour pushed out well before the end of their term.
The selling point is: we suffer some pain now in order to get to a better place some time in the future. If targets are not met we need to double and triple down and do more of the same. If people are objecting to that we need to enforce it by law and any other means necessary. Despite pitfalls we need to hold on and keep focused at the endpoint which is of course some time in the future.
Oh, and at the same time spend much more money on defense and aim at confrontation with Russia. Those arms can be made using hydro carbons which is where the Americans come in so it wont count.
Maybe Trump could annex UK as a colony.
The way things are going, he could buy it at fire sale prices.
We’d end up paying him to take it on…
We can use the money to pay Mexico to take California.
Then we can work a swap with Canada. They take New York and the New England states, and we take Alberta and Ontario. It would be nice to be able to drive to Alaska without any border checkpoints.
Your knowledge of geography is sadly lacking. You can’t get to Alaska through either Ontario or Alberta. The Yukon is in the way.
Humor – a difficult concept.
— Lt. Saavik
Would England, N. Ireland, Scotland, and Wales be separate states of the USA or would they all be lumped together into one? Get that one wrong and it could turn out to be more trouble than it was worth!
The Climate Change Committee MUST also be charged with showing how the climate goals achieve their objective. They assume that methods required to reach the goals are indisputable and that once reached the desired effects on climate and energy will be achieved. This is putting the cart before the horse and scientifically reprehensible. We are being made to suffer for something that is completely unachievable.
I want to see how those on the climate change committee live, luxury life styles I bet, using FF every day.
They could live like spartans but they would still be wrong.
They would still be wrong, but at least they wouldn’t be hypocrites.
I would not want to arm them. Spartan Phalanxes were deadly.
Not according to Epaminondas and the Theban Cohort! VDH has written and spoken extensively about the battle of Leuctra in 371 BC.
The previous chairman of the CCC was a former Tory MP who had a serious conflict of interest with his firm reputed to have been paid more than $700,000 from firms benefitting from net zero subsidies
Climate Change chief John Gummer faces calls to quit over payments from ‘green businesses’ | Daily Mail Online
His predecessor, another former Tory MP, was similarly conflicted.
After nearly two years no permanent successor has yet been a appointed. The current interim chairman is not a politician and has all the necessary credentials, having degrees in both physics and meteorology. He also boasts of having contributed heavily to the writing of IPCC reports, including acting as a Lead Author for the Fourth and Fifth] Assessment Reports, and a Co-ordinating Lead Author for the Sixth.
The rest of the committee are also experts who all have previously expressed the appropriately correct climate change views.
There is no real evidence that CO2 has any effect on our global climate system. For the truth about climate change try reading “The Rational Climate e-Book” by Patrice Poyet which one can download for free.
Goodness know how much it costs the UK tax payer to keep these clowns on the net zero gravy train. One day we’ll get a government of common sense and they’ll bin this lot.
You live in a democracy, imperfect though is. Common sense must flow, first, from the voters and then you will have a government of common sense.
Reminder to self… ‘you have no interest in visiting any of these countries ever’.
I say go for it so the rest of the world, except California, can learn what not to do.
Russia, Communist China, North Korea, Iran…..all are laughing at Western countries for hobbling their manufacturing and mining capabilities, and destroying the very thing that made them great, which is rapid response to population demand.
China is capitalist and nationalistic, but not communist. Communist ideology has long been abandoned. Same for Vietnam.
The last I knew, the only allowed political party in China is the Chinese Communist Party. Do you really think that it is a bunch of capitalists or nationalists who built an entirely new but empty city, that built 100s of miles of empty roads, that built a large and still expanding Navy, Army and Air Force, that has obliterated the somewhat democrat governance of Hong Kong, that has militarized the South China Sea, that… Yes, it is true that their current Government is really Fascist (private property allowed so long as you do with it what the Government demands) but they still call themselves the CCP. Ideology has absolutely nothing to do with China’s current Government. Power is everything whatever they wish to call it.
Communist ideology always devolves to dictatorship and autocracy without exception.
Socialist ideology always devolves into communism.
Government run capitalism, is fascism, not a form of capitalism.
Thou shalt hug the doomsday clock too.
Time for the citizens of England to impose “lifestyle changes” on all members of this committee and all their supporters.
Easily said yet not so easy to accomplish.
The costs of reaching Net Zero In Britain are of course utter fabrications. The committee has made ludicrous assumptions of the costs of wind power which bear no resemblance to reality whatsoever. In fact, all of their assumptions are nonsense and none of them can happen. If we must have a climate change committee, why can’t we staff it with people who are not utterly deranged? Any serious attempt to follow these insane recommendations will bankrupt Britain and destroy what is left of our economy.
Sane people wouldn’t end up doing what their masters in the rest of government tell them to do.
You have stated the very purpose for all of it.
Of course, the government can control the weather. You people are just science deniers. /s
They can be fruitful and multiply…….
A chap by the name of George Orwell wrote a book about this. It was intended to be a cautionary tale, not a “how to” manual.
I fear the country of my ancestors is close to being beyond saving. I do believe that Donald Trump realizes this as well and is trying to save them, and the rest of Europe for that matter, by employing a bit of “tough love”. A weak UK and weak Europe is bad for them and bad for the US as well. Question is, is there enough time?
Never say never. We English have come this far – so far
Trump and Keir Starmer seemed to have a mutual admiration society going during their meetings yesterday.
Trump says he loves the UK, and he thinks he and the UK will make a good, new trade deal which will make tariffs unnecessary.
And Trump says the statue of Winston Churchill is back in its place in his White House Oval Office.
Here is the CCC in action: https://youtu.be/LFrdqQZ8FFc?si=P5-JDBT1qpIbZbU4
Difficult work, but someone’s got to do it.
The UK hopefully has much the same number of idiots as anywhere else in Europe but, unfortunately, they all quite recently decided to become politicians at the same time. These idiots believe these tiny islands in the Atlantic Ocean can control their energy needs purely by virtue signalling achieving visible rises in energy prices, invisible (to idiots) reductions in living standards.and immeasurable changes in carbon dioxide levels not reported anywhere. ..
Next up there may be an unplanned and rather long unnatural break accompanied by the sound of much stuff falling to pieces or being broken up. Normal service may be restored eventually, sometime, if ever (which is the hopeful outcome if you follow the logic). Reported elsewhere at the time is that some Starmer guy missed his turn on the treadmill claiming it hurt too much. .
It may be a god-send if these goals are achieved,. The British people will revolt, finally, and before that, millions will return to their homelands where life is better.
I was with you all the way up to…
“millions will return to their homelands where life is better.”
Where on Earth did you get that?
I think he was referring to UK’s “immigrants”.
If life is better, why are all those illegal aliens not leaving en masse?
Money. We pay them a fortune to be here and that money is the only reason most of them are here to begin with. Once that money stops, a lot of them will go home again.
Life in England gets so bad, that life in Pakistan looks good by comparison.
So, the capacity to increase production of heat pumps from 60,000 to 1,500,000 exists? Clowns!
They’ll just buy them from China.
China will build them for you.
We install about 4mm a year in the US. We can probably pick up some of that demand
Look on the bright side. This will greatly reduce immigration as more and more people will go somewhere else.
Including the natives!
Sounds like the UK needs a douche like DOGE.