The Business Innovation and Skills Committee has expressed concern about the gap between current energy policy delivery and the government’s ambition to meet future carbon budgets.

In it’s first report on the government’s Industrial Strategy Green Paper, the group of MPs said: “With regards to meeting future carbon budgets, while clearly we welcome the explicit commitment to this ambition in the industrial strategy, we are deeply worried that the Committee on Climate Change has identified significant gaps between our ambition and our current policy delivery.It appears unrealistic to assume that closing this gap can be divorced from issues around the affordability of decarbonisation and the types of energy innovation that the UK should be looking to grow.”

The MPs noted that progress in reducing emissions since 2012 has been “almost entirely” achieved by the power sector. They said that the industrial strategy needs to include “meaningful policies” to support decarbonisation of our industries and buildings.

Iain Wright MP, Chair of the Business Innovation and Skills Committee, said: “To achieve an economy that works for everyone the Government needs to bring together a much sharper focus on horizontal policies, such as skills and innovation, whilst adopting an ambitious mission-approach which could tackle challenges such as decarbonising energy intensive industries, tacking health and social care, or automating and electrifying transport infrastructure, which will create prosperity and employment for the UK and its citizens for the long-run.”

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