In 2023, the United Kingdom recorded the lowest emissions of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere in the last 145 years, according to provisional government data analyzed by
Carbon Brief
,
the website specialized in climate change science and policies.
Emissions were reduced to 383 million tons of carbon, compared to 412 in 2022. It is a decrease of 5.7%, much more noticeable when compared to the global increase of 1.1%.
This level has not been recorded since 1879, the year Mosley Street, in Newcastle, became the first English street with electric lights.
The good data, however, cannot be attributed to the specific policies of Rishi Sunak's conservative government, but to a chain of circumstantial factors such as a winter of moderate weather, an increase in gas prices derived from the war in Ukraine —which reduced its consumption— and a greater import of electricity from France.
Progress towards a zero emissions target, which London continues to set in 2050, is favored by such spectacular data.
But above all, it has been a sustained trend of reduction that has made it possible to bring a dose of realism to that objective.
“Many attribute the progress the UK has seen to the fact that it has outsourced much [of its industrial production and therefore] its emissions, but if you look at the last decade, that progress has taken place in sectors where it cannot be outsourced.” emissions, such as electricity or construction.
“Most of the reduction in the industry had already occurred long before,” said Simon Evans, Climate Policy Director at
Carbon Brief
.
In the United Kingdom, only one coal plant remains open, in Ratcliffe-on-Soar.
Its closing is scheduled for next September.
Just 12 years ago, two-fifths of the country's electricity supply came from the combustion of this mineral.
In 2022, the use of coal will not reach more than 23% of the total energy basket.
Since 1990, UK emissions have been reduced by 53%.
The responsibility of the different sectors of the economy in this pollution has changed in hierarchy and percentage of distribution.
If before 2014, the energy sector was the largest emitter, in 2022 its participation moved to fifth place, far behind other sectors such as agriculture.
In the case of both the latter and the transport industry, the emission level has barely changed in the last 30 years.
Despite the improvements experienced by much more efficient combustion engines, and an increase in the fleet of electric vehicles - they already reach one million in the country -, car sales, and their size, have not stopped increasing. .
Improvements in the EU
If the British reduced their emissions by 5.7% last year, the EU as a whole did so by 8%.
The progress made by the United Kingdom in recent years has a lot to do with the elimination of the use of coal, but that strategy is beginning to see its performance reduced as the plants have disappeared.
“We are and will continue to be the world leaders in clean energy, and the first major economy to have halved its emissions between 1990 and 2022,” the British Ministry of Energy Security and Zero Emissions said in an official statement.
However, the Sunak Government has received harsh criticism from environmental organizations and international organizations for the electoral measures announced this year, which represent a setback in some progress in the fight against climate change, and they have covered the Conservative Party's speech with a suspicious patina of denialism.
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