In 2019 the UK became the world’s first major economy to introduce a legal obligation to achieve net-zero greenhouse gas emissions by 2050, in line with broader commitments made as part of the Paris Agreement on combating climate change.
The move signified a clear commitment by the UK government to address Britain’s role in mitigating global warming. It also required the government to set out parameters by which the UK creates an equilibrium between the amount of greenhouse gases it emits versus those it removes from the atmosphere, otherwise known as achieving net zero.
While this might sound relatively straightforward, for a country whose emissions rank 36th in the world per capita and 17th overall, reaching this ambitious target will be anything but.