On 11 March 2026 the Climate Change Committee published a Supplementary analysis of the Seventh Carbon Budget, covering the cost and benefits of UK Net Zero. It says
Under a range of assumptions, the benefits of Net Zero consistently outweigh the costs. While achieving Net Zero requires investment, for every £1 spent there will be £2 to £4 in benefits. A decarbonised UK will provide greater energy security and be cheaper to operate and maintain than the system we have today.
Our Seventh Carbon Budget advice report estimated that the additional cost of ... our pathway to Net Zero would be around £4 billion per year on average between 2025 and 2050, relative to a baseline of no further emissions reductions from today. ... Any assessment of the costs of Net Zero needs to take account of the costs of the alternative. Our analysis compares the cost of a Net Zero economy to the cost that would otherwise need to be spent in an economy where we do not pursue Net Zero any further. We find that the gross system cost of the Balanced Pathway falls below the baseline cost from 2041, consistent with the finding in our Seventh Carbon Budget advice that upfront investment into low-carbon technologies generates operating cost savings.
This is a 68-page document: these extracts are from the Executive Summary. For more comment see
Reaching net zero by 2050 ‘cheaper for UK than one fossil fuel crisis’ | Fiona Harvey in the Guardian, 11 March 2026
Originally posted in Second Nature 056 (March 2026). Category climate, tags CCC, net zero, seventh carbon budget.
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