Wednesday, June 21, 2023
Welsh Government missing its climate change targets
A Wales-on-line article from a few weeks ago, highlights just how difficult it is to turn around the current climate change crisis. They say that the Climate Change Committee (CCC), the UK's independent adviser on tackling climate change, believes that the Welsh Government is not on track to meet its emissions targets.
The CCC warns that there has been insufficient progress on emissions reduction with the policy powers available. Their report argues that action should now be focused on those sectors where Welsh ministers have the greatest capacity to effect change.
The site says that the Welsh Government has set the target to reach net zero greenhouse gas emissions by 2050 through mapping out a series of legislated five-yearly carbon budgets and with other interim targets, but the report states that if this decarbonisation is to happen then Wales must now accelerate:
The report says that the tangible progress has been insufficient “in many areas that are dependent on Welsh Government policy powers”. It says that “most notably” tree-planting rates and peatland restoration rates are far too low and development of the charging infrastructure needed to support the transition to electric vehicles is not happening quickly enough.
On the rate of new woodland creation in Wales the report said it had “been consistently very low and is currently less than a third of the Welsh Government’s target of 2,000 hectares per year, which in turn is significantly less ambitious than the CCC’s pathway”.
It does however praise them for work done in the waste sector noting that “recycling rates remain higher than in the rest of the UK, but improvements have stalled in recent years”. The report also highlighted the “positive steps” such as the recent decision to cancel all major road projects on environmental grounds” while adding that the “Welsh Government is not using its policy powers to full effect”.
The report also said: “In those sectors where policy is mostly controlled in Wales the effort is insufficient to achieve the emissions reduction required. In particular, agriculture and land use are missing an overarching decarbonisation strategy and the Welsh Government’s plan for the Second Carbon Budget (2021-2025) projects a slight increase in emissions from agriculture. Low ambition in this sector puts the later targets at risk and increases Wales’s reliance on emissions reduction in sectors with reserved policy powers, such as industry.”
* Addressing the funding gap in 2024 for agri-environment financial support and overcoming non-financial barriers related to woodland creation through capacity-building and skills development;
* Delivering a widespread, reliable, and high-quality electric vehicle charging network and developing a full delivery plan for achieving Wales’s target of a 10% reduction in car-km per person compared to 2019 levels by 2030;
* Improving recycling policies to increase the currently stalled rates in Wales to ensure future recycling targets are met, and;
* Developing a detailed plan for delivering energy efficiency measures and low-carbon heat, drawing on local area energy plans, including clear deployment targets and investment costs, and enabling delivery of long-term plans to decarbonise public buildings, social housing, and fuel-poor homes.
So B+ for effort, but must do better.
The CCC warns that there has been insufficient progress on emissions reduction with the policy powers available. Their report argues that action should now be focused on those sectors where Welsh ministers have the greatest capacity to effect change.
The site says that the Welsh Government has set the target to reach net zero greenhouse gas emissions by 2050 through mapping out a series of legislated five-yearly carbon budgets and with other interim targets, but the report states that if this decarbonisation is to happen then Wales must now accelerate:
The report says that the tangible progress has been insufficient “in many areas that are dependent on Welsh Government policy powers”. It says that “most notably” tree-planting rates and peatland restoration rates are far too low and development of the charging infrastructure needed to support the transition to electric vehicles is not happening quickly enough.
On the rate of new woodland creation in Wales the report said it had “been consistently very low and is currently less than a third of the Welsh Government’s target of 2,000 hectares per year, which in turn is significantly less ambitious than the CCC’s pathway”.
It does however praise them for work done in the waste sector noting that “recycling rates remain higher than in the rest of the UK, but improvements have stalled in recent years”. The report also highlighted the “positive steps” such as the recent decision to cancel all major road projects on environmental grounds” while adding that the “Welsh Government is not using its policy powers to full effect”.
The report also said: “In those sectors where policy is mostly controlled in Wales the effort is insufficient to achieve the emissions reduction required. In particular, agriculture and land use are missing an overarching decarbonisation strategy and the Welsh Government’s plan for the Second Carbon Budget (2021-2025) projects a slight increase in emissions from agriculture. Low ambition in this sector puts the later targets at risk and increases Wales’s reliance on emissions reduction in sectors with reserved policy powers, such as industry.”
* Addressing the funding gap in 2024 for agri-environment financial support and overcoming non-financial barriers related to woodland creation through capacity-building and skills development;
* Delivering a widespread, reliable, and high-quality electric vehicle charging network and developing a full delivery plan for achieving Wales’s target of a 10% reduction in car-km per person compared to 2019 levels by 2030;
* Improving recycling policies to increase the currently stalled rates in Wales to ensure future recycling targets are met, and;
* Developing a detailed plan for delivering energy efficiency measures and low-carbon heat, drawing on local area energy plans, including clear deployment targets and investment costs, and enabling delivery of long-term plans to decarbonise public buildings, social housing, and fuel-poor homes.
So B+ for effort, but must do better.
