Environment & Energy
UK Energy and Environment Policy Timeline
Latest Environment & Energy Publications
Route ‘35
Ed BirkettTransport is now the UK’s biggest source of climate-warming greenhouse gases. While other sectors slash their emissions, cars continue to produce 15% of our annual emissions, and the figure is still rising.
To solve this, the Government plans to ban new petrol and diesel cars by 2035. Here Policy Exchange sets out how this can be achieved, following best international practice.
Outbreaks and Spillovers
Benedict McAleenan and William NicolleZoonotic pathogens (those that originate in animals) are a growing risk to human populations. There were three times as many outbreaks in the 1990s as in the 1940s, and cases continue to rise. The majority of new infectious diseases originate in animals, including well-known diseases such as SARS, avian flu, Ebola and HIV. Whilst too early to say for sure, it is likely that SARS-CoV2 (the virus that causes COVID-19) originated in bats. Here Policy Exchange examines what is to be done to reduce the threat to human health and the global economy.
Bigger, Better Forests
Benedict McAleenanIncreasing tree cover in the UK is a matter of land use policy.
This simple fact is often forgotten amid a rush to re-forest Britain through multiple schemes and interventions. This seemingly overlooks the fact that silviculture – the art and science of growing trees – is just one subset of land management.
In the last 25 years, several government-backed new forests have been established or proposed, from the mid-1990s National Forest to the most recent ‘Northern Forest’, which is to stretch across the North East and North West of England. Though laudable and important (we propose a project of our own in this report), these schemes alone are not sufficient to address more fundamental barriers to tree planting, many of which are the direct results of public subsidies for a particular model of farming.
Latest Environment & Energy Blogs
Policy Exchange and the PM’s 10-Point Plan
The Prime Minister’s green announcement reflects several policies that we’ve championed over more than a decade.
After some key personnel changes at the top, the Prime Minister has begun his administration’s ‘reset’ with a long-awaited 10-Point Plan for a Green Industrial Revolution. The Plan has been broadly praised for its breadth and welcomed as a major statement of intent across multiple technologies. He combined knotty, unglamorous issues such as home heating with big, visionary technologies like CCS and hydrogen.
Time to Shine
The Prime Minister’s commitment to 40 gigawatts (GW) of offshore wind by 2030 is a huge undertaking that will galvanise industry to redouble their efforts to deploy clean energy projects. However, despite the scale of the ambition and the falling cost of offshore wind, the UK could also be getting more from a range of energy technologies by helping them to work together. ‘Hybrid’ clean energy projects, such as solar farms working with batteries, have the potential to significantly reduce costs by sharing components, particularly expensive grid connections. Other combinations include wind with hydrogen production or wind with interconnectors.
UK Energy and Environment Policy Timeline
The next 12 months are hugely important for the UK’s energy and environment policy, with the Government preparing to host the COP26 climate conference in in Glasgow in November 2021 and committing to ‘Build Back Better’ from the Coronavirus pandemic.
Policy Exchange is tracking around 30 milestones for UK energy and environment policies, which we have collated in the timeline below. We plan to update and maintain this timeline with the latest Government announcements, White Papers and consultation documents.
Latest Environment & Energy News
Modern farming policy will reward enhancing the environment, rather than subsidising inactivity
Warwick LightfootPolicy Exchange’s Warwick Lightfoot argues in City AM that farming subsidies should be redirected to farmers who enhance the environment and invest in research and development.
Future farming policy to reward enhancing the environment – as called for by Policy Exchange
Policy ExchangeEnvironment Secretary Michael Gove has announced that a post-Brexit agricultural policy will reward farmers for public goods rather than acreage – as recommended in Policy Exchange’s Farming Tomorrow. The paper says that flood prevention, tree planting and biodiversity should all be subsidised rather than food production.
Joshua Burke gives evidence to Parliamentary committee
Joshua BurkePolicy Exchange Energy and Environment Research Fellow gave evidence to the House of Lords EU Energy and Environment Sub-Committee, speaking on opportunities for waste management following Brexit – the subject of our report Going Round in Circles.
