The then energy secretary Ed Miliband (second from left) at the Acorn project in Aberdeenshire, one of the CCS projects due to receive government funding, in summer last year. Photograph: PA Images\/Alamy Stock Photo\/Alamy Live News.View image in fullscreenThe then energy secretary Ed Miliband (second from left) at the Acorn project in Aberdeenshire, one of the CCS projects due to receive government funding, in summer last year. Photograph: PA Images\/Alamy Stock Photo\/Alamy Live News.Cut spending on \u2018fairytale\u2019 carbon capture plans, campaigners urge chancellorChris Packham says \u00a324bn scheme is \u2018national embarrassment\u2019 and joins calls for more funding to help households lower billsCampaigners are calling on the chancellor to cut the government\u2019s \u00a324bn spending plans for \u201cfairytale\u201d carbon capture technologies in favour of funding green schemes that can reliably cut emissions and lower energy bills.The environmentalist Chris Packham is leading an 11th-hour appeal for the Treasury to use this week\u2019s budget to scale back the government\u2019s \u201cexorbitantly expensive\u201d support for carbon capture, which is now more than the planned spending for the US, the EU, Norway and Japan combined.He said it was a \u201cnational embarrassment\u201d that the government had earmarked \u00a324bn to support a series of carbon capture and storage (CCS) projects developed by big oil companies, including BP and the Norwegian state oil company Equinor, and urged ministers to \u201cput things right\u201d.View image in fullscreenEnvironmentalist Chris Packham said the technology provided \u2018ludicrously uncertain results\u2019. Photograph: Jordan Pettitt\/PA\u201cCCS is a tech fairytale,\u201d the naturalist and broadcaster said. \u201cIt should be a national embarrassment that the UK is pumping more taxpayer money into it than any other country in the world.<\/p>\n
This budget is a chance to put things right.\u201dThe intervention comes as the government reportedly plans to reduce the grants available to households hoping to swap their gas boiler for an electric heat pump. This shift is considered crucial to cutting the carbon emitted when heating buildings, which makes up around a fifth of the UK\u2019s total greenhouse gas emissions.Packham called on the government to safeguard funding promises \u201cthat empower households to lower bills\u201d rather than \u201cbankrolling exorbitantly expensive projects with ludicrously uncertain results\u201d.The leaders of many economies have backed carbon capture technology designed to trap the emissions from fossil fuel infrastructure before they are released into the atmosphere. Proponents believe that piping carbon dioxide into underground storage could provide a permanent climate solution for industries that are unable to replace fossil fuels with cleaner alternatives.Although there are instances where the technology has worked successfully, many high-cost projects have struggled to progress and there are many examples where carbon savings have proved to be far less than expected. Green groups fear the technology has been promoted by fossil fuel companies to prolong the use of fossil fuels.Packham said a failure to rein in the planned CCS spending \u201cwould be yet another strong signal that this government is putting big oil above people and the planet\u201d.The great carbon capture con: behold the wasted billions Burnham could claw back | George MonbiotRead moreAled Dilwyn Fisher, a senior researcher at Oil Change International, said: \u201cIt\u2019s worrying that spending on climate is being cut in favour of defence, but cutting support for proven climate solutions while continuing to bankroll unreliable carbon capture projects would add insult to injury.\u201cThis budget should be an opportunity to put public money where it can make a real difference to the climate and help cut people\u2019s energy bills, rather than continuing to gamble billions on the fossil fuel industry\u2019s latest expansion plan.\u201dWork on the UK\u2019s first CCS projects has begun at the East Coast Cluster near Teesside and Humberside, in north-east England, and at the HyNet Cluster near Merseyside and north Wales, in north-west England.The second phase of the government\u2019s CCS support plan includes \u00a3200m to support the Acorn project in Aberdeenshire, alongside \u00a380m from the Scottish government.skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotionRosie Hampton, a campaigner at Friends of the Earth Scotland, said over the summer that the government\u2019s climate response was being built on \u201cfantasy plans about turning the North Sea into Europe\u2019s carbon dumping ground\u201d while politicians should be focused on \u201cclimate solutions that will improve people\u2019s lives, such as warm homes, better public transport and decent green jobs\u201d.Martin McCluskey, the parliamentary undersecretary at the Department for Energy Security and Net Zero, told an industry event this month that the government remained committed to carbon capture but fiscal pressures may require decisions on the pace of the industry\u2019s development.New ways to remove CO2 from atmosphere must grow much faster, report saysRead moreThe Carbon Capture and Storage Association (CCSA) said the UK\u2019s first projects had already awarded more than \u00a34bn in supply-chain contracts, which could support about 350 UK companies and 5,500 construction jobs.\u201cPulling back now would undermine investor confidence, risk leaving infrastructure underused and deepen industrial decline,\u201d said Mark Sommerfeld, the CCSA\u2019s UK director.\u201cThis budget must honour existing commitments, turning today\u2019s progress into lasting growth, energy security and reindustrialisation,\u201d he said.The government has been contacted for comment.Explore more on these topicsCarbon capture and storage (CCS)Greenhouse gas emissionsBudgetEnergyOilFossil fuelsEnvironment policynewsShareReuse this content<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
The then energy secretary Ed Miliband (second from left) at the Acorn project in Aberdeenshire, one of the CCS projects due to receive government funding, in summer last year. Photograph: PA Images\/Alamy Stock Photo\/Alamy Live\u2026<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":32193,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-32192","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-politics"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/demo.tcjhomeaccents.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/32192","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/demo.tcjhomeaccents.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/demo.tcjhomeaccents.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/demo.tcjhomeaccents.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/demo.tcjhomeaccents.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=32192"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/demo.tcjhomeaccents.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/32192\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/demo.tcjhomeaccents.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/32193"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/demo.tcjhomeaccents.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=32192"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/demo.tcjhomeaccents.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=32192"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/demo.tcjhomeaccents.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=32192"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}