AN ACTION plan to tackle the climate emergency is central to all parties’ manifestos ahead of May’s Holyrood election.
The Scottish Government has committed to transforming the country into a carbon net zero nation by 2045 while MSPs have agreed to cut Scotland’s 1990 levels of carbon emissions by 75% by 2030.
We take a look at what the parties are bringing forward in their plans to deal with the climate and biodiversity crisis.
SNP – carbon neutral islands, biodiversity and peatland funding and cutting car kilometres
The SNP is investigating “pilots for some islands to run on 100% renewable energy” with plans with at least three islands over the next five years to allow the communities to become fully carbon neutral by 2040.
The party has committed to investing an extra £500 million to help tackle the biodiversity crisis, more than £250 million to restore 250,000 hectares of Scottish peatland by 2030 and increase new woodland creation targets to 18,000 hectares per year by 2025.
The SNP has pledged to decarbonise one million homes by 2030 with £1.6 billion of investment, while all new homes and buildings from 2024 will be required to use renewable or zero emission heating systems.
The SNP has committed to reduce ‘car kilometres’ by 20% and phase out new petrol and diesel cars and vans by 2030. The party also wants to remove “the majority of fossil fuel buses” from public transport by 2023.
READ MORE: Sturgeon places hydrogen technology central to SNP's climate strategy
The SNP is pledging to “shift half of all funding for farming and crofting from unconditional to conditional support with targets for biodiversity gain”. The SNP is also backing the development and scaling up of hydrogen technology.
The SNP will bring forward a Circular Economy Bill to encourage reuse and cut waste, particularly sing-use plastics. The party will also review why so much waste in Scotland ends up being incinerated.
Scottish Conservatives – nature networks, new national park and new farm payment system
The Scottish Tories have committed to drawing up a nature bill to “strengthen environmental protections on land and sea” with one in nine species in Scotland threatened by extinction.
The party wants to review marine protected areas and promote sustainable fishing and effective stock management with a £25 million cleaner seas fund used to remove harmful products including plastics.
The Conservatives want to set up nature networks to safeguard protected areas and end peat extraction for use in compost and increase peatland restoration to 20,000 hectares annually by 2025.
The party has promised to increase new tree planting to 18,000 hectares annually by 2025 and create Scotland’s third national park in Galloway.
The party has pointed to a lack of progress it says has happened for farmers and draw up a new farm payment system.
The Conservatives’ manifesto stresses that “North Sea oil and gas has a long future of many decades ahead” and has pointed to the UK Government’s £16 billion North Sea Transition Deal to protect jobs in the sector.
Scottish Labour – warmer homes and more trees and peatland restoration
Labour has placed improving energy efficiency standards at the heart of its climate strategy – with a commitment to retrofit all homes across Scotland to a minimum of energy efficiency rating C by 2030. The party’s manifesto points to reviewing the use of large-scale incineration of waste.
Labour has pledged to increase the current 11,000 hectares of tress planted a year to at least 15,000 hectares a year, building to at least 18,000. The party has also committed to increasing peatland restoration to 20,000 hectares each year, alongside measures to end commercial peat extraction.
The party wants to support a plan for ocean recovery with at least one tenth of Scotland’s seas fully protected, and a further 20% highly protected, from destructive and extractive activities by 2030.
Labour will support councils to run their own bus services, creating a green bus fleet and moving towards the long-term aim of universal free bus travel.
Scottish Greens – harness tidal power, faster action and more investment in restoration
The Greens want to ban the sale of new petrol and diesel cars from 2026 and scale up the use of tidal energy with a target of 1GW in Scotland by 2030.
The party has pointed to plans to replace air passenger duty with a frequent flyer levy once the pandemic is over – while onshore wind capacity would be scaled up under the party’s plans. The party would also end public support for new buses that are not fully electric from 2022.
To decarbonise heating systems, the Greens want to introduce grants to replace fossil fuel boilers with 500,000 heat pumps to be installed by 2030.
The Greens support a ban on new fossil fuel boilers from 2025 for buildings off the gas grid, and 2028 for all buildings.
The party has pledged £150 million for a nature restoration fund, £250 million for more and better national and regional parks, £250 million for public and community native woodland planting and £145 million extra to restore peatlands – with all peatland restored by 2030 and a ban on peat extraction and sale for horticultural use.
The Greens have pledged to “make emission reductions and climate mitigation measures a compulsory requirement for all (agriculture) subsidies” and support the partial replacement of corporation tax at the UK level with a carbon tax that increases over time in line with climate targets.
Scottish Liberal Democrats - low carbon homes and new national parks
The Lib Dems want to move 1 million homes to zero emission heating by 2030 and invest in low carbon heat networks and establish new national parks and woodlands.
The party has committed to setting legally binding nature recovery targets and expand woodland using at least 50% native species, increasing Scotland’s forest cover by an additional 36 million trees every year.
The Lib Dems have promised to set a new target for 100% of energy generated in Scotland to come from renewables by 2030 and “plan for the inevitable end of oil and gas” by ensuring there is a just transition for workers.
The party wants to introduce a circular economy law, including targets that reduce the carbon emissions produced in creating everything we consume.
Alba Party
Alex Salmond’s party has pressed the case for commissioning a “roadmap” setting out how Scotland will electrify its transport system to ensure targets for ending petrol and diesel cars are not missed.
The party will “support the transition away from fossil fuels by introducing a wellhead production tax on Scotland's offshore oil industry as soon as it is possible”.
Alba’s manifesto says the tax will replace corporation tax as the basic means of offshore taxation, with the revenue used to finance “the move to carbon capture projects, the hydrogen economy and the further transition to offshore and marine renewables”.
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