The National Audit Office has released a new report looking at the approaches to achieving net zero across the UK.

This report has been produced jointly between the public audit offices of the four UK nations, Audit Scotland, Audit Wales, National Audit Office and Northern Ireland Audit Office.

On its website, the NAO says: “Climate change is one of the defining challenges of our generation. The UK government and the devolved governments must act collectively to meet their objective of reducing greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions across the UK to ‘net zero’ by 2050. The powers needed to do this sit with the UK government (reserved powers) and the governments of Northern Ireland, Scotland and Wales (devolved powers). In looking across the UK, we have identified four key themes.”

The authors say the report has several aims:

  • To set out how the responsibilities and powers for achieving the net zero target are split between the UK government and each of the devolved governments
  • To provide insight and stimulate public discussion on each UK nation’s overall approach to achieving net zero
  • To support the scrutiny of governments’ arrangements to achieve net zero
  • To lay the foundations for potential further work on climate change by the UK’s public audit offices.

Read the full report here.