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Britain adopted the target of reaching net zero carbon emissions
by 2050 under former Prime Minister Theresa May and was quick to
build up its renewable energy capacity in earlier years.
But progress in onshore and offshore wind has been hampered by a
raft of rule changes, prompting some developers to warn they
will struggle to invest in Britain without improved incentives.
The government also approved its first new deep coal mine in
decades in December and on Monday Sunak said his government
would grant hundreds more licenses for North Sea oil and gas
extraction.
Asked on LBC radio whether he was a "dangerous radical" for
wanting increased production of fossil fuels, Sunak defended
Britain's climate record.
He said Britain had decarbonized the quickest out of all of the
G7 major economies. To back his claim, the government cited
national inventory data submitted to the United Nations
Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC).
"We should not take any lectures from anybody about our record.
Our record is fantastic. It's better than everyone else's,"
Sunak said during questions with LBC listeners.
Sunak said he cared about Britain reaching the target of net
zero by 2050 and wanted to leave the environment and the climate
in a better state for his children.
But he added that even when Britain reached net zero, a quarter
of energy would still come from fossil fuels, which should be
sourced domestically.
"If I have to get that energy from halfway around the world and
ship it here, it will come with three or four times the carbon
emissions," he said.
"The right, sensible thing to do is to use the energy we have
here at home as we transition to net zero, which we are going to
do, but this is a part of doing that."
(Reporting by Alistair Smout, Editing by Angus MacSwan)
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