Recommendation 22

The draft Plan is significantly reliant on negative emissions technologies to stay within carbon budgets. Notably, it models for double the level of abatement during Scotland’s third budget period than the Climate Change Committee did in their “balanced pathway”. It is to be hoped that NETs will play a major role in decarbonisation. However, they remain a developing technology, largely untested at scale. The economics of their use at this scale is also uncertain. Placing this level of reliance on NETs does appear to be a significant delivery risk that will require careful monitoring and reappraisal in the light of new evidence and data. Assuming the finalised Plan maintains a similar position to the draft on NETs, we see this as a legacy issue for a future energy committee to investigate in the next Parliamentary session.