Independent experts from the Committee on Climate Change have said that a new runway at Heathrow can be delivered within the targets for greenhouse gas emissions.
The Committee called on the government to publish a strategy for how emissions targets would be achieved, in light of planned expansion at Heathrow. It has also provided specific advice on how this could be done.
“It is inconceivable that we shall meet our climate change targets if we build another runway. Do people not realise that there will be no planet to leave to their great grandchildren and the people that follow afterwards?”
Ken Loach, 27 October 2016
“There was an independent review taken and the Committee on Climate Change, which advises the government independently on whether it is meeting its climate change commitments, said this can be done within the carbon emissions standards that we set.”
Greg Clark MP, 27 October 2016
Just this week the independent Committee on Climate Change (CCC) called on the government to publish its strategy for aviation emissions now that it has decided to expand Heathrow Airport.
It said that “it is the CCC’s role to monitor overall progress against carbon budgets and the 2050 target, rather than examine specific projects”.
The CCC said that for greenhouse gas emissions targets to be reached aviation emissions will have to meet strict criteria. To do this they have said the UK will need to reduce emissions from aviation to their 2005 levels by 2050.
This would allow the government to achieve their target of reducing all emissions to 80% of 1990 levels by 2050, which is the target set in the Climate Change Act 2008.
In 2014 aviation emissions were 9% below their 2005 levels.
Update 30 November 2016
On 22 November the CCC wrote to Greg Clark MP to ask for clarity on the government’s plans for Heathrow Airport emissions. Although the letter has been reported as the CCC telling the government another runway at Heathrow will breach the emissions target, this is not the case.
The CCC asked for more information on how Heathrow will continue to meet the emissions target. It was concerned that the government’s “central case” for the new runway only showed the full value of Heathrow’s planned runway if emissions were carbon-traded. This means they would exceed the targets, but the government could ‘buy credit’ from other countries who don’t reach their own targets and have ‘emissions to spare’.
The CCC has asked Greg Clark to clarify whether further plans are to be published which show how the targets would be met without using this method. It also asked how, if a carbon-traded option is used, other areas of the economy might limit their emissions to compensate for Heathrow’s. The CCC said it had “limited confidence” that this would be possible.
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