I’ve been resisting the urge to comment on the Johnson 10 point plan until I thought I knew what was in it

So I avoided a hot take

Sorry, that's not very Twitter of me I realise

Here’s some thoughts

https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/936511/10_POINT_PLAN_BOOKLET.pdf

Overall plan delivers 181MtC cuts to 2030 & £3 bn new investment from govt.

Neither is enough on its own to tackle the UK contribution to the climate emergency

And, for example, compare £16bn announced today for defence

https://twitter.com/DrSimEvans/status/1329099966640517121 https://twitter.com/mtpennycook/status/1329120902370496519

Claim plan will deliver around £29bn private investment by 2030 should not be ignored

But still that’s a substantial shortfall given investment level will need to be of order of £30bn per yr from now

What will be in Spending Review & National Infra Strategy? Needs big uplift

On the specifics

Offshore wind. Govt wants to insist on higher UK content, which is right

The issue before has been extra cost to developers (partly from historic lack of investment in supply chain) and Stat Aid rules

How this will be solved is unclear

Hydrogen – trials in homes.

But hydrogen from fossil gas is NOT zero carbon. Climate Change Committee estimate 60-85% emissions cut compared to gas boilers

Will hydrogen infra built (& run by powerful lobby) but not zero C become a problem when we approach zero C in 29 yrs?

Nuclear – no word on Sizewell other than warm words.

Again, will Spending Review or Energy White paper deliver an outcome? It’s going nowhere without a lot of subsidy.

The usual shrouds of mystery apply to both decision making process & justification/criteria

Small modular reactors

Clearly apunt on untried (from US experience, not v good) technology.

Given private sector will need to find nearly 60% of cash we’ll see how serious they are, or if they'll be back for more

Remember SMRs do not solve nuclear waste or security issues

Electric vehicles

This is the big one. A phaseout of new petrol and diesel cars and vans by 2030

UK Govt are both world leading and v serious about it

New money for not just charging infra but also to get supply chain in UK

There is of course some questions. What constitutes 'significant' capability?

Govt are wondering how far should a vehicle be able to drive on electric to be allowed to be sold after 2030. 20 miles? 40 miles?

Will decide how much plug in hybrids will still be available in 2031

And this is potentially v significant

No other country is thinking seriously about a phaseout date form fossil HGVs afaik (twitter can correct me I'm sure)

So genuine leadership

there's also a coded nod towards road pricing becoming the new form of transport taxation, reflecting the leaked Treasury paper at the weekend

Most of the walking and cycling stuff had been announced previously

But interesting commitment to new body

I hope re local authorities they'll help and support rather inspect and criticise

On energy efficiency, another £ billion for making it happen, with extension to the current grant scheme. That's good news

That's now £4bn agreed of the £9.2bn pledge in Tory manifesto. Which itself likely inadequate compared to the scale of the challenge

Plenty more to do

But this is good - extending what was the EU Eco-Design Directive standards on appliance so they are forced to become more efficient

Remember rows about inadequately-powered toasters?

Those siren voices seem to have been ignored

There'll be devil in the detail though

This commitment to increasing efficiency standards on new homes has disappeared from the version now on the website

It needs to be back

Cutting the zero C standard for new homes in 2015 was a pointless act of eco-vandalism by George Osborne

Enthusiasm for Carbon Capture and Storage as part of the levelling up agenda

Details will matter. As pointed out earlier, creating hydrogen from fossil gas for home heating is not a good plan

CCS for processes like cement more defendable proposition for zero C economy

£40mn for nature restoration, we understand £20mn is new money. the last round of funding was oversubscribed 7 times

Well, I guess any money is good

But it compares poorly with what is needed, estimated by conservation groups to be £800 million per year

So is anything missing?

Well yes, lots

Nothing on onshore wind and solar, demand constrain on aviation, the new building regs dropped

Rumoured announcements on making electricity grid more flexible seem to have been dropped late on

And there's a thing about coordination...

An important promise on electric heating (heat pumps). Not big enough, but useful

Will this be coordinated w proposed hydrogen heating, & with insulation plans?

If people install a heat pump, but then hydrogen is supplied to them, will we all pay for 2 sets of infrastructure?

there's nothing in this plan about how delivery will be managed at a local level on heat, and not much on transport

For the UK's overly centralised decision-making and resourcing, this is going to be a major challenge if we're serious about zero emissions

It has been briefed that this promised Task Force will help make the pieces fit together, although there's no remit as yet

If so membership of this Task Force needs to be independent and not have companies who have vested interest involved

Why??

Because now we have climate targets established, international momentum and a govt doing stuff, there will be huge amounts of ££ at stake as to **HOW** we do it:

How much renewables vs nuclear?
How much hydrogen vs electric heating?
How much demand saving vs boosting supply?

How much do we rely on (as yet) unproven negative emissions tech?

Given the challenges how much do we rely on innovation to close the emissions gap vs known but expensive solutions?

How much should today's taxpayers pay vs those in 3 decades time?

Those are just some of the Qs, there'll be many more

There are many routes to net zero emissions and these choices could be shrouded in secrecy

If that Task Force is influential in shaping them, vested interests shouldn't be running it

ENDS

A few people have pointed out even more things the 10 point plan DOESN'T deal with:

* domestic oil & gas production
* diet/meat consumption
* Agriculture
* consumption based emissions
* waste management/oil-based plastic
* resource efficiency
* ocean protection/'blue' carbon