The UK Government Escalates Its Failures In Climate Policy

The UK Government has undergone yet another reshuffle after newly appointed prime minister Liz Truss selected her cabinet, specifically promoting ministers that support her vision for the UK. 

The UK Government has undergone yet another reshuffle after newly appointed prime minister Liz Truss selected her cabinet, specifically promoting ministers that support her vision for the UK.  That vision? Whatever she thinks will appease the 81,326 Conservative party members - not the general population -  that voted her in.

Subsequently, her promises and rhetoric have so far skewed heavily to the right of the political spectrum. Truss and her cabinet appear happy to fan the flames of the culture war, seemingly hoping to cling to power through sheer acrimony. They have refused to extend the windfall tax on energy companies’ obscene profits and desperately resurrected unpopular policies of low taxes for the wealthy, unlimited bonuses for bankers, and zero tolerance for immigration.

To cap it off, of course, the Conservatives also remain completely ignorant of the climate crisis and contemptuous of any serious attempts to tackle it. Already the new PM and her cabinet seem determined to drag the UK backward in its efforts to reach net zero, with a raft of shortsighted policies (such as lifting the moratorium on fracking).  One of the more controversial new appointees is Jacob Rees-Mogg, who was given the crucial role of Secretary of State for Business, Energy, and Industrial Strategy.

The man responsible for the UK’s energy policy seems more like a politician from the 19th century than the 21st, with his understanding of climate science being no exception. He believes it is unrealistic for scientists to project future changes in the climate as meteorologists struggle to correctly predict the weather. Alarmingly, this is the man who is currently the most influential figure in Britain’s energy strategy. 

Rees-Mogg has also called to extract “every last drop” of oil and gas from the UK’s reserves and it appears his destructive appetite for fossil fuels has been satisfied after the government opened up yet another licensing round for oil and gas exploration in the North Sea. The government is auctioning off 100 new licences that will eventually lead to a spike in domestic oil and gas production.

They claim this will secure Britain’s domestic energy supply in the wake of Putin’s invasion of Ukraine and his weaponization of gas and oil exports.  Opening up licenses for fossil fuel exploration will offer no urgently needed relief to exorbitant energy bills, however, as there is typically a five to a ten-year period between exploration and production. Despite this, the government has deviously positioned the new licensing round as a direct response to Putin’s actions, falsely signaling to the public that it will bring down energy bills.

The government is using Putin’s reckless, self-serving actions to justify its own.  The International Energy Agency released a report that found there is no space for further fossil fuel production if there is any hope of limiting global warming to 1.5℃ above pre-industrial levels. The UK’s own Climate Change Committee has also spoken out against plans to increase domestic fossil fuel production, stating it is incompatible with the UK’s climate pledges and noting that any increase in UK extraction of oil and gas would have, at best, a marginal effect on the prices British consumers faced in the future.

Truss’ government has already suffered a deserved backlash after the recent announcement of their reckless economic plans, potentially triggering a vote of no confidence in the new PM before she’s even finished her first month in office. Now is the time to make sure her government’s similarly calamitous energy policies face the same response.