UK "will have to intervene in the market to meet climate obligations" | Environment

UK's obligations in response to this week's UN warnings on global warming will be controversial and politically burdensome, leaving the country in "unexplored territory" and testing the political consensus on change climate change, warned his climate advisor.

Chris Stark, Chair of the Climate Change Committee (CCC), predicts that the government will have to regulate the industry and intervene controversially in Parliament. He is responsible for advising ministers on the speed and depth of emissions reductions and how to achieve them. His committee will soon begin work on the advice of the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC).

"We will be challenged like never before," he said. "We will be scrutinized like never before. We must stick to this scrutiny. We will force politicians to make difficult decisions. We will test the political consensus [on climate change]. "

He added that reducing emissions from the quantities needed "would require answers that the unfettered market will not provide".

"It will be fascinating to see how Parliament will react to the long-term goal," Stark said in an interview that took place before the official release of the IPCC's findings, but after that specific results have been communicated. "It will be a real test of how parliament has changed over the last 10 years. The political environment will be more difficult. Parliament is more divided.

Ministers committed to seek advice from the CCC, established under the Climate Change Act 2008, a statutory advisor for setting and achieving greenhouse gas targets, on how to react to the IPCC report released on Monday. Foreign Minister Claire Perry announced in April that she would ask the committee to reconsider the UK's current climate target – an 80% reduction in emissions from 1990 levels by 2050 – soon after the conclusions of the IPCC.

Any analysis is likely to focus on the UK becoming "net zero" in terms of emissions by mid-century. This would mean reducing emissions as much as possible, for example by developing clean energy and switching to electric vehicles, while increasing UK carbon "sinks" such as forests and soils. This could also include the option of offsetting the remaining emissions by investing in emission reductions in other countries.

The CCC was not notified in advance of Perry's announcement, although Stark said he was "thrilled" with the announcement and has not yet been officially invited to undertake the new analysis. As long as the government has not made a formal request, which could arrive next week, the conditions for an investigation and a report can not be defined.

"Our work must be above all reproach, the gold standard, [but] I think what we say will be controversial, "he said. "We will examine the problems and challenges of this country and this economy that will take us to an unknown territory."

The committee will take at least six months to produce such a report, which means that the results will probably be published shortly after the official Brexit date next March.

Stark said the CCC's independence, which defines a "shackle" of five-year carbon budgets, which require strategic goals beyond the current parliament, was at the heart of its mission. If a government wishes to challenge the objectives, it must apply for judicial review, a measure that no government has passed for 10 years.

"We are committed and politically conscious, but it is very important that we do self-employment," he said. "We have a role to play and we use it extremely seriously. We have analytical rigor – we are a technical body – and I do not think we have been politicized. We are not an NGO, we are not a militant group. "

But Stark cautioned against the risks for the prevailing political consensus between the parties on climate change in the UK, which could make policy development on the issue more difficult than in the past. "There was some consensus on climate change in 2008 [when the Climate Change Act was passed], "he said." The consensus is still there, but the enthusiasm that was his 10 years ago is not here now. "

Stark does not think that such a law – unique at the time of its adoption, providing for long-term obligations on binding emissions cuts for future parliaments – would be adopted in the same form today. . "I hope the government continues to view climate change as a problem [on which to] show leadership, "he said. "The Climate Change Act was a really brilliant piece of legislation and has stood the test of time."

The political upheavals and the attention of the government, they added. "There is finite political attention and the government is naturally concerned about the impacts of Brexit," he said. "The biggest threat is a change in policy and we must always be aware that politics can change. I would be worried about a change in the parliamentary atmosphere. It's an unprecedented political moment. "