The UK has exceeded the five-year targets set by the UK’s Climate Change Act.

The Third Carbon Budget (2018 to 2022) was met with a surplus, assisted by the economy-shrinking effects of the pandemic. Today the Committee has written to Minister Graham Stuart, congratulating the Government for overshooting its legal obligations.

All three Budgets have been met or bettered to date, the first between 2008- 2012 and second between 2013-2017. In total six carbon budgets have been set to date, covering 2008 to 2037.

The legal targets for UK greenhouse emissions are set over a five-year period and at the end of a carbon budget, the Climate Change Committee (CCC) must advise the government of the day on future actions.

The net carbon account for the Third Carbon Budget period was 2,153 MtCO2e (excluding international aviation and shipping), and thus the UK over-achieved its Third Carbon Budget by 391 MtCO2e which is 15 per cent of the budget, based on final 2022 emissions.

Least anyone get carried away, the CCC emphasised that there is still work to be done, with Professor Piers Forster, interim chair of the Climate Change Committee (CCC), saying: “We congratulate the Government on meeting the latest emissions target – the Climate Change Act is working. But the path ahead is tougher and we risk losing momentum if future legal targets are loosened on a technicality.”

Recent UK decarbonisation has been driven by good progress in the decarbonisation of electricity supply and through a rapid phase-out of coal. Industrial emissions also fell due to reduced output, but in other sectors, such as transport and buildings, the UK is not on track and progress will need to accelerate rapidly to match that made in other areas.

---