by Sallust
The UK’s Net Zero agenda is making families poorer by driving the productivity crisis and squeezing living standards, economists have said.
This shocking revelation features in a story in the Mail. Investment bank Peel Hunt commissioned a report in order to find out if there was a link between decarbonisation and Britain’s collapsing productivity:
They found a “clear link” between falling energy capacity and weak productivity in the UK, which has “hurt economic performance and growth in living standards”.
A decline in UK electricity supply, which began in 2006, coincided with the start of structural weakness in productivity growth, the research added.
The economists said their analysis challenges the Government’s claim that there is no trade-off between Net Zero and economic growth.
Prior to winning last year’s General Election, Labour pledged to decarbonise the UK’s electricity grid by 2030 as part of accelerating Net Zero efforts.
Since entering Downing Street, Sir Keir Starmer has lifted a de facto ban on onshore wind farms in England and given consent for a slew of solar projects.
The PM has hailed Net Zero as “one of the economic opportunities” of this century, while business chiefs recently pointed to an £83 billion boost from the sector last year.
But the Tories have said the UK’s Net Zero target “leaves us economically worse off” and admitted putting the 2050 deadline into law was among “mistakes” they made when in power.
The report’s damning verdict was:
The result of the UK’s decarbonisation efforts, so far, appears to be weak economic growth, high energy prices, de-industrialisation and no significant impact on the overall trajectory of global emissions.
If an economy throttles its production of energy, it impairs its capacity to produce all types of goods and services. Productivity is the major driver of per capita GDP.
It’s not all doom and gloom though. If you’re in your 20s or 30s there’s something to look forward to (at least while the sun is shining and the wind is blowing):
“If the Government can stay on track with plans to build new renewable capacities, electricity supplies can rise sharply,” they added – although they warned new technology such as Artificial Intelligence would ramp up energy demands.
But that’s hardly what the Confederation of British Industry came out with:
The report contrasts with a recent analysis by the Confederation of British Industry that suggested the Net Zero sector in the UK has become a “powerhouse of job creation and economic expansion”.
But as the Daily Sceptic’s Chris Morrison points out, Net Zero is facing global collapse, while in the Telegraph Nick Timothy says Net Zero is a luxury we can no longer afford:
Decarbonisation in one country – or more accurately one continent – is only possible in a globalised economy. Britain has managed to reduce its carbon emissions at least in significant part by shedding its domestic industries and importing goods instead. This is obviously a pointless exercise, as global emissions increase when goods are manufactured in countries with dirtier energy sources and poorer environmental standards, and when the goods must be transported around the world.
The reality of decarbonisation – that as long as the policy runs faster than technology allows, and other countries do not follow our lead – is that it means deindustrialisation, with all the consequences that follow. The country is less resilient to shocks, supply chains are stretched and we are exposed to instability in other parts of the world.
The Mail‘s piece is worth reading in full.
Discover more from Watts Up With That?
Subscribe to get the latest posts sent to your email.
This is a catastrophe, really, considering Net Zero policies and subsidies do not and cannot do anything for the planet and in particular cannot change its climate. Climate changes all the time but it is NOT man made and cannot be changed by him.
There was an old adage that said if it ain’t broke don’t fix it. I quess the new adage is if it ain’t broke break it.
That’s not new. It’s standard operating procedure for people who identify as “the left”.
“if it ain’t broke…”
Just chuck it and get the latest model.
I did that.
My ex-wife was furious
The basis of all Marxist variant strains is to destroy one or more aspects of traditional civilization!
There isn’t one born who looks in the mirror and doesn’t believe they see someone who will get it right this time! That is why it is such an incredibly dangerous AND addictive mass delusion!
The marxists know that when people are happy and content, they won’t be going around demanding that government save them.
They need to break society in order to create this crisis.
If it ain’t woke, break it?
Wokeachusetts is still aiming for Net Zero- with the idea that MORE of the same will lower costs. The Mass Save program takes $$$ from all of us to subsidize heat pumps, etc. Meanwhile, an in-law living near Boston who just built a new home with a heat pump- says they’ve been cold all winter. They say if they turn down the thermostat at all- at night or if they’re out of the house for many hours – the heat pump struggles to bring the temperature back up- so they have to leave it up all the time which is expensive.
Mass Save plan may raise heating bills
“an in-law living near Boston who just built a new home with a heat pump”
“The Rest Of The Story” is missing.
A modern house – designed for a heat pump – should work in the Boston area. Built-in resistance heaters are used sometimes. Cost is something else. Elec-Rate in Boston is about 3X what I pay and 5X what friends in another county pay. Programmable thermostats remove the issue of “bringing the temp back up”. {Full disclosure: I have a catalytic burner wood stove as supplemental and emergency heat.}
The design of the house and the heating system was done by their middle age son- a smart guy but not an engineer- some sort of biochemist.
So, not sure if I understand your perspective. You like heat pumps? And you recommend them for people in high electricity cost areas like Wokeachusetts?
I’m in the Pacific Northwest, west of the cascades. The climate is much more temperate that John’s, who is east of the Cascades. My heat pump works fine. Getting below 20f here is very rare.
Boston can get to -20 F. Not every year, but it can get that low.
No, programmable thermostats do not “remove the issue,” they create it. Any thermostat “setback,” whether done manually or by some programmed “schedule,” means the home has been allowed to get colder – which means there is a bigger temperature differential to make up to get things to a comfortable temperature again.
Since heat pumps are attempting to extract heat from very cold air, this is going to take a long time.
Heat pumps in cold climates are a really stupid idea. Forcing their adoption while simultaneously destroying the electric grid is another really stupid idea.
If only my governor could understand this. Good thing I got a new oil furnace a few years ago. I’m 75 and won’t need to replace. 🙂
My wife and I replaced our oil furnace (old, about ready to crap out) with a tankless gas heater. best thing we did and now wish we’d done it much sooner. Immediately cut our monthly heating/oil bills in half or more, plus significantly reduced our monthly electric bills since we got rid of the electric hot water heater and electric stove.
Oh yeah, meant to say I’m 65 and hope I won’t need to replace before we either sell the house or buy the farm.
I keep graphs of the temperature and HP usage. There is no significant difference in the number of hours the HP runs during an average day [24 hours] for a day that the temperature was not lowered, like on the weekend or fo the days that it was scheduled to go to a lower level when you are not at home. You do not save money by lowering the temperature while out of the house – unless it is an extended vacation. Worse, lowering the temperature on a vacation could cause you to cause your water pipes to freeze up and even break. [Has happened twice to me and I no longer allow a “Vacation” setback.]
Sounds like the system is undersized. That’s a pretty common problem.
Problem is, That the people do these heat-loss/adsorption tests in a test house built in a an empty warehouse.
The temperature of the air coming from the register is rarely more than a single digit greater than the air temperature in the house. That means the air circulating in the room actually makes you feel cooler than the actual setting. Thus you need a sweater. In the winter, every piece of furniture item in your house will decrease in temperature will decrease in temperature after you quite adding heat to the house. Thus, when you turn up the temperature in addition to warming the air you need to warm up all of the heatsinks in the house.
feature not bug
Almost every square inch of England is north of the fiftieth parallel, not exactly an ideal latitude for solar panels.
C’mon man, when have the realities of physics ever stopped “the cause”?
Virtually every square metre of Scot is north of 55′, people in Inverness 57.5’N have Solar PV. Completely insane.
Labour, when it was elected last summer, I thought would be the government to reveal the utter nonsense of the so-called climate crisis. What wasn’t apparent at the time was the new Trump presidency, one which I think might just knock some sense into the donkeys leading us. His approach to Ukraine has them all stumped.
The once proud British military is now but a distant memory. If the Russians invaded the Isle of Wight tomorrow could we retake it? Probably not. That’s how depleted it is. Militaries guzzle a lot of fuel and if Starmer is really serious – and I very much doubt he is – about ‘rearming’ it won’t be electric tanks, electric planes and electric self-propelled artillery.
Still this government is serving to illuminate the huge chasm between common sense and decarbonisation/deindustrialisation; economic growth vs net zero.
They say Miliband could be for the chop, yet they still spout pretty much the same net zero stuff:
“Mr Miliband is reportedly at risk of losing his job in an upcoming Cabinet reshuffle. It has been suggested that Sir Keir Starmer will sideline net zero in a “dash for growth”.
One Whitehall source stressed that the Cabinet disagreements were not personal and amounted to a “genuine intellectual debate” about how to ensure the switch to green energy was used to boost the economy. They said: “It’s about competing priorities. There is a jobs-first group of people who very much believe that the point of the green transition should be to reindustrialise Britain.”
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/business/2025/03/04/miliband-cabinet-rebellion-net-zero-promises/
And Rachel from Accounts (Customer Complaints) has: “insisted “net zero is the industrial opportunity of the 21st century.”
Genuine intellectual debate, my foot. We don’t need any more reports telling us the bleedin’ obvious. We need a total change of tack, one that hasn’t the faintest hue of green to hamstring it.
“If the Russians invaded the Isle of Wight tomorrow could we retake it?”
The UK does have nukes, right?
Under US control…
”When is an independent nuclear deterrent not an independent nuclear deterrent?
To many experts, the answer is all too obvious: when the maintenance, design, and testing of UK submarines depend on Washington, and when the nuclear missiles aboard them are on lease from Uncle Sam.
https://www.politico.eu/article/uk-trident-nuclear-program/
After all, this is Airstrip 1.
interesting- had no idea
You may have noticed, Joseph, that Russia has rather more. Our nukes could be enough to deter a potential aggression if we kept ourselves to ourselves but it is not a good idea to go interfering in other nations’ back yards.
The problem is that when you make it a policy to “not interfere in other people’s backyards”, it is not long until you find yourself in the backyard of those other people, and they are making it a point to interfere in yours.
I think once the ‘nukes’ come into play, no one ‘retakes’ anything.
Net Zero in the UK is far from the only cause of the malaise.
Germany, the UK, France, etc., are in Chaotic De-growth Mode
Their Euro elites are forcing populations to put up with, and pay for, tens of millions of unvetted walks-ins, who make minimal contributions, cause maximal pain, crime and chaos, all while sucking from the government tit.
Spending more on defense and Net-Zero green stuff, will be accelerating de-growth
,
The woke elites in Europe and the US are pre-maturely closing, already-paid-for, in-good-working-order nuclear plants.
The woke elites have banned 1) oil and gas fracking projects, 2) gas/oil pipelines, 3) gas/oil storage systems near power plants, and 4) new energy exploration projects, as part of “leaving it in the ground”
.
The very important results of DOGE are not reported by the leftist, USAID-subsidized, Corporate Media, but the criticisms of DOGE are reported 24/7/365.
And so, the people in New England, the US and Europe are permanently kept in the dark, already for at least 5 decades, or more.
The Social-Media, by gaining eyeballs, is quickly ending the Corporate-Media monopoly, which is losing eyeballs.
But the Euro elites are hell-bent to put them in straight-jackets ASAP
“Net Zero in the UK is far from the only cause of the malaise”
At the election they were going to “smash the gangs“. In the last 4 days…
1,168 Small Boat Migrants Arrive in March So Far
https://order-order.com/2025/03/05/1168-small-boat-migrants-arrive-in-march-so-far/
Smashing the gangs? As Mr Punch might put it: “That’s the way to do it“.
Prof. Gordon Hughes recent paper for Net Zero Watch ‘Will Net Zero reduce electricity costs in 2030?’ puts the total costs of the energy system in 2024 at £34.1bn and the Net Zero System based on NESO’s 2030 plan at £58.9bn.
Prof Hughes is an energy economist at Edinburgh University.
Miliband moriendum est!
This is no “shocking revelation” to anyone capable of critical thinking.
Making energy scarce, less reliable and more expensive WILL have massive, negative economic consequences.
Anyone who for one second “believed” otherwise is a deluded fool.
Roger Pielke Jr. has been publishing analysis on the UK decarbonization success for more than a decade. From the beginning, his data suggest nearly all the CO2 emissions reductions were the result of shutting down industrial capacity. Domestic and nonindustrial commercial users weren’t affected by shutting down old power plants because demand for power came down and most people likely remarked at how easy it was to reduce emissions. Net Zero is now forcing changes more broadly, driving energy prices higher due to intermittency of renewables and low capacity utilization in fossil fueled power back up plants and now the pain of poor energy policy is coming home to roost.
Well duh!!!
This is what Doomberg calls the Net Zero Delusion! According to the Great Green Chicken, the road to Net Zero passes through civil unrest and riots as the destruction of the energy grid intensifies. As an analyst of the energy market, his videos are well worth watching.
The chicken might look green on the outside, but on the inside he is red, white and blue!
But mostly red…
At least the Carpathia is coming.
10 years away
Michael Deacon in the UK Telegraph [Story Tip]. My emphasis
And what will we gain, in return for our noble economic self-sacrifice? Not much. Even if we magically achieved Net Zero by three o’clock tomorrow afternoon, this triumph would have a negligible impact on global temperatures – for the obvious reason that we’re a very small country, responsible for less than 1 per cent of the planet’s annual greenhouse gas emissions.
So, unless China, the US, India, Russia, Brazil, Indonesia, Japan, Iran and all the many other countries with far greater emissions magically achieve Net Zero too, we’ll have impoverished ourselves for nothing. Climate change will still have made British beaches as balmy as the Caribbean’s. And yet, none of us will even be able to afford an ice cream.
Funny, isn’t it. Labour ministers spent their first months in office loudly complaining that the Tories had left them a “£22 billion black hole”. Yet they seem hell-bent on making that “black hole” even bigger. First with their £18 billion handout to Mauritius as part of their bonkers Chagos Islands deal. And then with Ed Miliband’s exciting plans to destroy our remaining industries, deface our countryside and freeze our living rooms.
Still, there is a tiny sliver of hope. Rumour has it that Miliband may be for the chop in a spring reshuffle, with the Government allegedly plotting to dial back on some of his more extortionate schemes. At least by a little, anyway.
In the spirit of “Cargo Cult Science” it is worth pointing out that quite a few other things have happened since 2005 which might be expected to impinge on productivity. Such as Brexit and immigration and covid, but it’s an interesting observation. The most obvious productivity hitter is that the iPhone was introduced in 2007.
You don’t need a study to figure this out. All that needs to happen is to stop government interference in energy production. All forms of energy production receive equal treatment no favoritism no mandates. Fossil fuel and nuclear will flourish and wind and solar will die on the vine. When fossil fuel and nuclear flourish we all flourish. Not like now where we all pay the price to prop up expensive, unreliable, intermittent and short lived renewable.
People die from lack of power and heat. Will Milliband and his ilk be charged with murder? Because they should be!
No, he’ll be able to enjoy the generous, tax-payer funded pension that MPs receive, maybe even get a knighthood for services to politics, and live out his life in his fantasy world. When it comes to implementing lunatic policies, muck never sticks to politicians.
You don’t need to be an economist to realise that high electricity prices stifle growth, competitiveness and raise the cost of living!
The article goes wrong with this statement:-
“If the Government can stay on track with plans to build new renewable capacities, electricity supplies can rise sharply,” they added – although they warned new technology such as Artificial Intelligence would ramp up energy demands.”
Renewables are the cause of high electricity prices and need a severe curtailment, together the increase in capacity of firm generation, gas nuclear and even coal if now economic.
Even then the long term subsidy contracts for renewables will impact prices.
It’s a good job then that we have an experienced economist as Chancellor. Oh, wait a minute…
There is no doubt National productivity takes a nosedive when your manufacturers stop buying steel for a dollar that they used to forge into something to sell for $20, then your wholesalers and retailers resold and resold for $100. Just buy it from China on Amazon for $10 including shipping. Who needs productivity ?