The UK Prime Minister last week set out his ambitious ten-point plan for a green industrial revolution which is to create and support up to 25,000 British jobs.

The plan covers clean energy, transport, nature and innovative technologies, and Boris Johnson’s blueprint will allow the UK to forge ahead with eradicating its contribution to climate change by 2050, something which is particularly crucial in the run-up to the COP26 climate summit in Glasgow next year.

The plan is part of the PM’s mission to level up throughout the country and will mobilise £12 billion in Government investment to create and support up to 250,000 highly skilled green jobs in the UK, and spur over three times as much private sector investment by 2030.

At the centre of this blueprint are the UK’s industrial heartlands including the North East, Yorkshire and the Humber, West Midlands, Scotland and Wales. All these areas can drive forward the green industrial revolution and build green jobs and industries of the future.

The Prime Minister’s ten points area:

1. Offshore wind: Producing enough offshore wind to power every home, quadrupling how much we produce to 40GW by 2030, supporting up to 60,000 jobs.

1. Hydrogen: Working with industry and aiming to generate 5GW of low carbon hydrogen production capacity by 2030 for industry, transport, power and homes, and aiming to develop the first town heated entirely by hydrogen by the end of the decade.
2. Nuclear: Advancing nuclear as a clean energy source, across large-scale nuclear and developing the next generation of small and advanced reactors, which could support 10,000 jobs.
3. Electric vehicles: Backing our world-leading car manufacturing bases including in the West Midlands, North East and North Wales to accelerate the transition to electric vehicles, and transforming our national infrastructure to better support electric vehicles.
4. Public transport, cycling and walking: Making cycling and walking more attractive ways to travel and investing in zero-emission public transport of the future.
5. Jet Zero and greener maritime: Supporting difficult-to-decarbonise industries to become greener through research projects for zero-emission planes and ships.
6. Homes and public buildings: Making our homes, schools and hospitals greener, warmer and more energy efficient, whilst creating 50,000 jobs by 2030, and a target to install 600,000 heat pumps every year by 2028.
7. Carbon capture: Becoming a world leader in technology to capture and store harmful emissions away from the atmosphere, with a target to remove 10MT of carbon dioxide by 2030, equivalent to all emissions of the industrial Humber today.
8. Nature: Protecting and restoring our natural environment, planting 30,000 hectares of trees every year, whilst creating and retaining thousands of jobs.
9. Innovation and finance: Developing the cutting-edge technologies needed to reach these new energy ambitions and make the City of London the global centre of green finance.

 

Prime Minister Boris Johnson said: “Although this year has taken a very different path to the one we expected, I haven’t lost sight of our ambitious plans to level up across the country. My Ten Point Plan will create, support and protect hundreds of thousands of green jobs, whilst making strides towards net zero by 2050.

“Our green industrial revolution will be powered by the wind turbines of Scotland and the North East, propelled by the electric vehicles made in the Midlands and advanced by the latest technologies developed in Wales, so we can look ahead to a more prosperous, greener future.”

In order to deliver on six points of the plan, the PM has announced new investment, including:

Carbon capture: To revitalise the birthplaces of the first industrial revolution, the UK will be at the global forefront of carbon capture, usage and storage technology, benefiting regions with industries that are particularly difficult to decarbonise.

An extra £200 million of new funding to create two carbon capture clusters by the mid-2020s, with another two set to be created by 2030. This increased the total invested to £1 billion, helping to support 50,000 jobs, potentially in areas such as the Humber, Teesside, Merseyside, Grangemouth and Port Talbot.

Hydrogen: Up to £500 million, including for trialling homes using hydrogen for heating and cooking, starting with a Hydrogen Neighbourhood in 2023, moving to a Hydrogen Village by 2025, with an aim for a Hydrogen Town – equivalent to tens of thousands of homes – before the end of the decade. Of this funding, £240 million will go into new hydrogen production facilities.

Nuclear: £525 million to help develop large and smaller-scale nuclear plants, and research and develop new advanced modular reactors.

Electric vehicles: Following extensive consultation with car manufacturers and sellers, the Prime Minister has confirmed that the UK will end the sale of new petrol and diesel cars and vans by 2030, ten years earlier than planned. However, we will allow the sale of hybrid cars and vans that can drive a significant distance with no carbon coming out of the tailpipe until 2035.

The UK car industry already manufactures a significant proportion of electric vehicles in Europe, including one of the most popular models in the world.

To support this acceleration, the Prime Minister has announced:

£1.3 billion to accelerate the rollout of charge-points for electric vehicles in homes, streets and on motorways across England, so people can more easily and conveniently charge their cars.

£582 million in grants for those buying zero or ultra-low emission vehicles to make them cheaper to buy and incentivise more people to make the transition.

Nearly £500 million to be spent in the next four years for the development and mass-scale production of electric vehicle batteries, as part of our commitment to provide up to £1 billion, boosting international investment into our strong manufacturing bases including in the Midlands and North East.

Reacting to the Government’s publication of its Ten Point Plan for a Green Industrial Revolution, Ian Liddell-Grainger MP, Chair of the All-Party Parliamentary Group on Nuclear Energy, said: “I warmly welcome the Government’s commitment to build both large and small-scale nuclear reactors as a path to net zero.

“New nuclear power will dramatically cut our emissions and generate thousands of good, highly skilled jobs across this country. I look forward to the Government setting out the detail in the Energy White Paper, and getting new projects over the line.”

Kate Neale, Sustainability Director at Cadogan, said: “We welcome the Government’s announcement that it will invest £1 billion into making new and existing homes and public buildings more efficient, including the bid to bring forward the date by which new homes will need to be warmed without gas heating to 2023.

“The last few months have brought into sharp relief the importance of tackling the climate emergency, and Cadogan is more focused than ever on actively reducing our environmental footprint, and collaborating with our partners across both the Chelsea community and our supply chain, to find innovative ways to progress the circular economy and make rapid advances in meeting net-zero ambitions. We believe that the built environment has an essential role to play in achieving carbon neutrality, and this must be recognised and supported in any new government policies.”

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