But what they both failed to mention is that UK energy and environment policy is in crisis – as pretty much everyone in the energy industry and green economy now agrees. The Tory regime has torn apart a raft of green policies without any credible replacements to date, and we remain off-track to meet our fourth and fifth carbon budgets.
We’ve heard this week that the potential for gas in the UK energy mix is “very limited” without CCS – something DECC mentioned just once in its 5000-word grand plan, after the sudden scrapping of £1bn CCS funding. We’ve heard that there will be “future misery” for UK homeowners if the Government doesn’t reverse its decision to remove the zero-carbon homes requirement – something not mentioned in DECC’s plans at all.
We’ve heard that the UK “must try harder” to attract investment in renewables – following a series of punitive changes to various subsidy mechanisms. And we’ve heard fresh demands for an “urgent review” of the Levy Control Framework (LCF) – after DECC confirmed it had overspent the £7.6bn budget for the LCF by a projected £1.5bn.
To use another Dad’s Army reference of “we’re doomed!” to summarise the UK’s energy and climate policy would, at this stage, be a little unreasonable. Amber Rudd and her team do deserve credit for their efforts to seal the deal in Paris. But, as the UN’s soon-to-depart climate chief Christiana Figueres has previously stated, it’s a “crying shame” that the UK’s international ambition is seemingly failing to be reciprocated on the home front.