'Green Industrial Revolution' for UK?

26 December 2020

On the fifth anniversary of the 2015 COP25 Paris climate agreement Boris Johnson promoted his plan for a 10-point 'Green Industrial Revolution' for the UK - as a combination of climate change response and coronavirus recovery plan - in a speech to the 'Climate Ambition Summit' hosted jointly by the UK, France and the UN on 12 December.  When the plan was announced in November Johnson wrote in the Financial Times (17 November)

"Now is the time to plan for a green recovery with high-skilled jobs that give people the satisfaction of knowing they are helping to make the country cleaner, greener and more beautiful.

"Imagine Britain when a Green Industrial Revolution has helped to level up the country. You cook breakfast using hydrogen power before getting in your electric car, having charged it overnight from batteries made in the Midlands.

"Around you the air is cleaner; trucks, trains, ships and planes run on hydrogen or synthetic fuel. British towns and regions — Teesside, Port Talbot, Merseyside and Mansfield — are now synonymous with green technology and jobs. This is where Britain’s ability to make hydrogen and capture carbon pioneered the decarbonisation of transport, industry and power."

Government press release    on plan announcement 18 November

Full text of the plan

The ten points of the plan are Offshore wind, Hydrogen, Nuclear, Electric vehicles, Public transport, Jet Zero and greener maritime, Homes and public buildings, Carbon capture, Nature, Innovation and finance.

Press reaction has been neutral to mildly sceptical, with many commentators noting that the proposed spend of £12bn - much of it already committed - is grossly insufficient in relation to the aim of achieving net zero by 2050, and the hope of attracting three times that amount from the private sector and creating 250,000 'green' jobs over-optimistic.

The Guardian offers a detailed review of each of the key areas of the plan, with the warning that  "some of the objectives are likely to be difficult to reach, and the plan has been criticised for a lack of ambition in key areas."
The Guardian  17 November
Fiona Harvey,  Environment correspondent

Mike Childs, head of policy Friends of the Earth, is quoted (in Edie.net, 18 November), as saying
“Despite a number of positive commitments, the Prime Minister’s 10-point plan falls far short of the ambitious policy overhaul needed to demonstrate real global leadership on the climate crisis. A much bolder approach is needed if the UK is to create the hundreds of thousands of new green jobs and other benefits that building a cleaner, safer future will bring."

The most fiercely sceptical reaction - "Boris’s green industrial revolution is doomed to fail" - came from The Spectator (which Mr Johnson once edited) on 21 November.
"Boris Johnson's ‘green industrial revolution’, which was announced this week, looks doomed from the outset. From our heating to how we transport food, the proposals would mean a complete overhaul in the way we live. Yet barely a word has been said about the immense practical difficulties involved in Johnson’s ten-point plan for Britain to go carbon neutral by 2050. Make no mistake, it will be close to impossible to achieve – and even trying could prove catastrophic."