carbon limited

Government launched a barrage of documents at us yesterday. I was mostly watching out for the Renewable Strategy but that was only a small part of it. Here’s the reading roundup:

• UK Low Carbon Transition Plan – this is the overarching doc. It’s basically the roadmap to meeting the legally binding carbon budgets from now to 2050 with some good stuff on how it will be done. But puts a hell of a lot of faith in nuclear, building new coal (with mythical magical CCS), and the efficacy of the EU ETS. 7m homes to get refurbed under Pay as You Save (more on this later). Cars to emit less carbon.
• Consultation on Renewable and Small Scale Low Carbon Electricity Financial Incentives – the consultation on the RO and the Feed in Tariff. They appear to have watered down the FiT saying 5% return is enough to attract investment. We’ve got to stop the government from nickel and diming its way into grand sounding but useless gestures.
• Renewable Energy Strategy – Following the draft version in 2008, this doc lays out the map for the UK to meet 15% of its total energy requirements from renewables by 2020 (this in an EU requirement as opposed to the other targets with are internal). A good thing: renewables claiming FiT’s are also likely to count towards Zero Carbon standard.
• Low Carbon Industrial Strategy – much of the above recycled but in the context of UK business. How jobs will be created and the costs of transitioning to a low carbon economy will be minimised. It might have been the picture of Peter Mandelson in the intro, but I struggled to maintain any enthusiasm reading this one. Tidal power to get £60m. Nuclear to get a £15m research centre (let the subsidies begin!), the SW of England to become a pilot low carbon economic area.