The Government has announced a new policy to make housing more sustainable.
22% of the UK’s Greenhouse Gas emissions come from heating homes, a significant proportion of the UK’s total emissions. In response to this, the Government has announced a Future Homes Standard.
This will require new build homes from 2025 to use low-carbon heating systems which will reduce carbon emissions from these homes by 78%. This will reduce carbon emissions from housing, increasing new build sustainability, and help to keep energy bills low.
In the meantime, the Government is also consulting on methods to reduce carbon emissions from homes by a third by 2020, allowing short-term reductions in carbon emissions.
This will contribute to the Governments goal of reaching net zero carbon emissions by 2050, reducing the UK’s contribution to global warming and being the first major economy to do so.
Commenting on the policy announcement, Caroline said:
“This policy announcement is great news in the quest to reduce carbon emissions.
“Given that 22% of UK carbon emissions are down to household heating, this new Future Homes Standard will be vital in reducing future carbon emissions and will help us meet the target of becoming carbon neutral by 2050.
“This is an incredibly important policy area, particularly among young people. I have seen first-hand the passion that many people feel about it, with the Gosport Climate Strike happening in the constituency recently and other demonstrations happening across the country. This will certainly help us achieve that goal of net zero emissions by 2050 in the long term.”
