The United Kingdom (UK) is leading the way in climate policy and reducing emissions, and this has been contributed to by the gradual abolition of coal and the transition to renewable energy sources, according to data from the International Energy Agency (IEA), which regularly conducts reviews of the energy and related climate policies of its member countries.
As they state, progress was made during the last government, and the UK is one of the first developed economies to legally adopt a zero emissions target, introducing legally binding carbon budgets as a five-year measure, which is why it created an independent body, the Climate Change Committee, with the legal authority to monitors the government’s progress towards climate goals.
The UK 2024 Energy Policy Review emphasizes that this country is a leader in the application of clean energy, especially in the field of wind farms. Renewable sources already account for more than a fifth of the country’s electricity production, a three-fold increase since 2012. Despite the increase in renewable energy supply, the UK’s total energy supply is still heavily reliant on fossil fuels, accounting for 77 per cent in 2022, up from 87 per cent in 2010.
“The electricity mix has changed significantly in recent years, with a sharp decline in generation from coal and an increase in generation from wind, bioenergy and solar photovoltaic (PV) panels. The fuel mix for district heating has also undergone changes, mainly due to the transition to natural gas and bioenergy,” the report states.
Transport is cited as the biggest polluting sector because it relies heavily on oil, which is why its accelerated decarbonization is needed. As one of the measures, the Government implemented strong policies to increase the use of vehicles with zero emissions (ZEV- Zero Emission Vehicles). Industry in the UK is also a major consumer of energy and a key contributor to emissions, accounting for around a fifth of energy consumption and 14 per cent of emissions. When indirect emissions (from electricity and heat used in the sector) are included, the share of industrial emissions rises to 21 percent. Indirect emissions have decreased significantly thanks to the decarbonization of electricity production.
In addition to supporting energy efficiency, the report calls on the UK to undertake efforts to support the electrification of industry, enabled by network expansion and connections to industrial plants. The commercialization and adoption of new technologies, the application of fuels such as hydrogen, can also play an important role in the decarbonization of industry.
Since the last IEA report, the UK government has adopted a number of strategic priorities for the energy sector in several documents, including: the Energy White Paper (2020), the Ten Point Plan for the Green Industrial Revolution (2020), the Net Zero Strategy (2021), the Energy Strategy Security of Britain (2022), Powering Up Britain (2023), Powering Up Britain: Energy Security Plan (2023) and Powering Up Britain: Growth Plan for Net Zero (2023).
Jasna Dragojević
Source: energetskiportal.rs
