SNP warned it is impossible to meet 2030 climate target
◆ Watchdog issues scathing report saying Scotland’s strategy to cut emissions by 75 per cent is ‘beyond what is credible’
chief executive of the Scottish Government’s statutory climate watchdog has warned SNP ministers that it is now impossible to meet their legal emissions reduction target for 2030 as his organisation set out a scathing assessment of progress.
Chris stark, the chief executive of the Climate Change Committee (CCC), has issued the alarm after publishing the advisers’ annual report into Scotland’s strategy to hit legally-binding targets, warning the 2030 target to cut emissions by 75 percent is “beyond what is credible”.
Scotland has missed eight of its past 12 annual emissions targets and is off track in meeting its 2030 target that is binding by Holyrood legislation.
SNP ministers had pledged to publish their updated climate change plan by November last year, but have delayed the document–a move mr stark has suggested is down to the numbers around the 2030 target not adding up.
In its annual report, led by Mr Stark, the CCC has bluntly stated “the acceleration required in emissions reduction to meet the 2030 target is now beyond what is credible”.
The document adds “current overall policies and plans in Scotland fall far short of what is needed to achieve the legal targets under the Scottish Climate Change Act”, warning “there are risks in all areas with significant policy powers devolved to the Scottish Government”, with particular concerns raised over transport, buildings, agriculture, land use and waste.
The report stresses “the Scottish Government should build on its high ambition and implement policies that enable the 75 per cent emissions reduction target to be achieved at the earliest date possible”.
When MSPS drew up legislationfor the climate change act, the CCC did not feel the 75 per cent reduction target by 2030 was achievable, but the Scottish Government’s full climate change plan, last published in 2020, set a pathway to achieving the legally-binding target.
But with 2030 creeping closer, Mr Stark said the CCC was “calling it” that the aim was now “impossible” to reach.
Speaking exclusively to The Scotsman, Mr Stark said: “We have been scathing, we’re really disappointed. and there is a big, flashing red sign over it.
“This is the first report the CCC has ever produced that said that in any part of the UK we have a target that cannot be met. there’ s no good setting targetsthat you feel are ambitious if you haven’t put a plan behind it. So we have never had in the c cc a pathway to hit that target. We don’t know how to do it.
“The chips are down here. this is exactly what we said would happen if you didn’t put a plan around it.”
Mr Stark said he was “hugely frustrated” at the Scottish Government delaying its updated climate change plan, and has suggested the numbers not adding up to meet the 2030 target could be behind the hold-up.
He said: “We’re in a situation where the target isn’t credible, there is no plan to hit it. the lord Advocate won't allow a plan to work that isn't legally sound. So I think the Scottish Government really has to think carefully about what it does now.
“The Act is pretty clear and they’re going to have to make a plan to hit it. And I’m sure that’s why we’ve seen delays to the clithe
This is exactly what we said would happen if you didn’t put a plan around it Chris Stark
mate change plan because the target is looming now.”
Askedw hats np ministers can do to respond to the lack of progress, Mr Stark said “the best option is to put in place a policy programme that actually delivers the targets”, but admitted that was proving to be difficult.
Mr Stark highlighted it was not simple to revise the statutory targets set out in legislation. He said: “That’s quite a difficult thing to do actually. If you look at the facility in the Climate Change Act, if you want to change the target, you have to first of all come to the Climate Change Committee for its advice and we are duty bound to only give advice in certain circumstances that would permit changing the target.”
Mr Stark said that would be a “change in the international circumstances or the science towards climate change”, insisting that “if anything it has got worse”.
He added: “So the idea of sort of loosening the targets is actuallyreally challenging under the Climate Change Act and that’s what it’s for. This was one of the features of the Act that is supposed to bind, not the government of the day, but future governments continuing into the future to keep them on the path .”
Mr Stark said “warning signs were there” that the 2030 ambition would become out of reach due to the failure to hit annual emissions targets, but insisted “there is a path to the targets beyond 2030”, including Scotland’s 2045 net-zero aim.
He said :” that’ s where if eel the Scottish Government should now be focusing, rather than pretending that 2030 is still in play.”
Scottish Labour net zero spokesperson Sarah Boyack said: “This utterly damning report lays bare the SNP’S woeful in action on the environment and the greens’ failure to deliver the change Scotland needs.
"The SNP’S environmental record is made up of empty rhetoric, missed targets and broken promises, and the Scottish Green Party is no longer worthy of the name. this lack of progress is not only an environmental travesty, but an economic one too, with jobs and communities being put at risk by a clueless government with no strategy.”
Scottish government net zero Secretary Mairi Mcallan said: “The Climate Change Committee have always been clear that meeting the legislated 2030 target, agreed by Parliament on a cross-party basis, will be extremely challenging, and may not be feasible.
“We remain fully committed to meeting our target of net zero emissions by 2045.”