Brits WILL have to get warmth pumps, electrical automobiles and eat much less meat to hit Keir Starmer’s 2035 carbon emissions goal, say authorities local weather advisers
Brits will need to get heat pumps, electric cars and even eat less meat to hit Keir Starmer‘s new climate target, advisers have warned.
The PM unveiled a pledge to cut UK greenhouse gas emissions by 81 per cent by 2035 at the COP29 summit in Azerbaijan yesterday.
He insisted it was possible to meet the goal without telling people ‘how to live their lives’, arguing that decarbonising the power network was the key.
However, the government’s Climate Change Committee (CCC) – which originally laid out the aim – has made clear that other changes, such more vegetarian and vegan diets and less travel, would also be needed.
CCC head Emma Pinchbeck told the Telegraph: ‘They’ve done the job with working out how to get a lot of clean, cheap domestic electricity.
‘We need to get technologies into people’s homes so they can use the electricity. What we’re looking for is progress on heat decarbonisation and transport decarbonisation and renewables.’
Keir Starmer (pictured) unveiled a pledge to cut UK greenhouse gas emissions by 81 per cent by 2035 at the COP29 summit in Azerbaijan yesterday
The government’s Climate Change Committee (CCC) – which originally laid out the aim – has made clear that other changes, such more vegetarian and vegan diets and less travel, would also be needed (pictured, campaigners at COP29 this week)
Climate advisers have insisted heat pumps are the ‘secret weapon’ for getting emissions down
Ms Pinchbeck said the ‘secret weapon technologies for the next decade are heat pumps and electric vehicles’.
Pressed yesterday on what Brits would have to do to hit the target, the PM said: ‘What we’re not going to do is start telling people how to live their lives. We’re not going to start dictating to people what they do.’
Asked again whether it was really possible to meet the goal without people changing their lifestyles, he said: ‘Yes, of course it is.’
Challenged that the CCC recommendations stressed the importance of adjusting behaviour, Sir Keir said: ‘The target is my target and the plan is my plan, I’m not borrowing from somebody’s else’s plan.’
The Tories warned the vow will lead to ‘sacrifice and hardship’ and would require a shift away from foods with a high carbon footprint and petrol and diesel vehicles.
In the Commons, shadow energy secretary Claire Coutinho told MPs that the pledge made the UK’s ‘already stringent carbon emission targets even higher’.
‘That’s despite the fact that we’re only one per cent of global emissions, and whilst the leaders of the world’s highest emitting countries, making up over 60per cent of emissions, are not attending,’ she added.
‘The Climate Change Committee has said this target will require, for an example, an accelerated shift away from meat and dairy, less travel and a gas boiler ban for the British people, and yet the Government’s approach would see our reliance on Chinese imports – a country which is 60per cent powered by coal – go through the roof.
Ms Coutinho said the government was ‘asking for more sacrifice and hardship from the British people in return for more goods from one of the world’s largest carbon emitters’.
She warned that would mean fewer ‘jobs in Britain and more carbon in the atmosphere’.
Sir Keir was also asked if he was ‘disappointed’ that there were so few leaders of major world countries present at the Cop29 summit in Baku, Azerbaijan.
The heads of the biggest polluters were notably absent, including Chinese premier Xi Jinping, US President Joe Biden and Indian PM Narendra Modi, while many EU leaders also stayed away.
The 81per cent target, which is based on reducing emissions compared with 1990 levels, forms the UK’s latest formal commitment to reducing its greenhouse gas emissions.
In 2020, when the CCC set the goal for 2035, it detailed a series of changes that would need to be made to life in the UK to achieve it.
These included phasing out gas boilers by 2033 and ending sales of new petrol and diesel vehicles including hybrids by 2032.
Sir Keir was one of the few major world leaders to attend the summit in Baku
CCC head Emma Pinchbeck said that government needed to ‘get technologies into people’s homes’
Sir Keir meeting the host of the summit, Azerbaijan president Ilham Aliyev yesterday – who suggested that oil and gas are ‘gifts from God’
It also said that around 10per cent of emissions savings would come from areas such as encouraging people to reduce meat and dairy consumption, slower growth in flights, reductions in car travel and cutting waste.
The UN’s climate change chief Simon Stiell hailed the UK commitment, saying it set a powerful example to other G20 nations.
Charities and academics also welcomed the goal, but cautioned that the Government would need a proper plan to meet the target.
Tanya Steele, chief executive at WWF, said the UK had positioned itself as a climate leader but said it needed to back up the target with ‘solid and credible delivery plans’.
Dr Caterina Brandmayr, from the Grantham Institute – Climate Change and the Environment, Imperial College London, said the target was ‘what the world needs’ but said it needed to back it up with strong policy and investment plans to show it was serious.
