The UK’s climate change minister Claire Perry has teased a “very broad’ Clean Growth Strategy that could be just days away from being unveiled.
Perry was answering questions at this morning’s opening of the UK’s first subsidy-free solar farm, a development which she labelled “really historic” and “tangible progress” in the furthering of renewable energy.
However the subject of discussion quickly moved on to the government’s eagerly anticipated but frequently delayed Clean Growth Strategy, previously known as the Clean Growth or Emissions Reduction Plan.
The strategy is to set out the government’s vision as to how the country meets its targets for decarbonisation set out in the fourth and fifth carbon budgets, as recommended by the Committee on Climate Change and ratified by former energy secretary Amber Rudd.
The plan, initially slated for publication last year, has been repeatedly pushed back and delayed however, causing consternation within renewables circles who have yet to be given any certainty regarding the investment landscape after the Levy Control Framework expires in 2021/22.
Responding to a question from Clean Energy News this morning, Perry revealed that this eagerly anticipated plan could now be just days away from publication and provided the first hints as to what shape it could take.
“These questions will be delivered in the Clean Growth Plan, and what I want to say about the CGP – which will be out very, very soon – is that we need to absolutely focus on renewable energy, but we need to broaden out across the economy.
“The way we’re going to meet our 2032 targets is yes, we need clean energy, but we need to decarbonise transport and we need to be hard on the business energy efficiency, so it will be a very broad set of policies that we need to deliver on, but you need to wait for just a few more – probably – days,” Perry said.
Quite how many days the industry will be waiting does however remain to be seen. The House of Commons rose for the conference season recess nearly a fortnight ago and does not return until 9 October 2017, just under a fortnight away.
Given the scope and far-reaching impact of the Clean Growth Strategy’s policies it is thought unlikely that the government would publish it while in recess.
