Boris Johnson to speed up green targets with new vow to slash Britain’s emissions

BORIS Johnson will tomorrow unveil a new target to slash Britain’s carbon footprint even more dramatically.

The PM will tomorrow commit to radical new goals to slash emissions by 78 per cent by 2035 compared to 1990 levels - a world-leading goal urged by the Committee for Climate Change.

He is expected to unveil the eco pledge on Wednesday ahead of an international summit on global warming being held by Joe Biden.

The PM will make the opening remarks at Thursday's Earth Day event.

The vow is even more ambitious than the current aim of slashing 68 per cent of emissions by 2030, and will pile pressure on other countries to follow suit.

Ministers have already made a legally binding vow to slash emissions to net zero by 2050 - a promise made under Theresa May.

Boris has made tackling climate change one of his top aims while in No10.

And he is keen to prove he is totally committed to the eco agenda ahead of COP26 - a global climate change summit being held by the UK later this year.

The targets will include emissions from transport - likely to include aviation and shipping - for the first time, making the goals harder to reach.

But ministers haven't yet spelled out exactly how they will reach the eco-goals.

Scientists and experts say that Brits will need to swap dirty gas boilers for expensive heat pumps and make thousands of homes more energy efficient, alongside eating less meat and planting more woodland and trees.

And people will have to ditch their petrol and diesel cars for electric too, with the PM setting a target of switching everyone over by 2030.

It's expected that Britain's industry will have to do big chunks of modernising to meet the green goals too.

The Department for Business Energy and Industrial Strategy said: “We will set our ambition for Carbon Budget Six shortly, taking into account the latest advice from the Climate Change Committee.”

Ed Miliband, Labour’s shadow business secretary, accused Downing Street of setting targets without having a plan to deliver on them.

He fumed: “While any strengthening of our targets is the right thing to do, the Government can't be trusted to match rhetoric with reality.

"Ministers have failed to bring forward an ambitious green recovery, passing up three major fiscal events to do so.

"They are flirting with proposals for a new deep coal mine, axed the vital housing retrofit scheme, and are way off track for our net zero targets."

He added: "We need a government that treats the climate emergency as the emergency it is.

“That means greater ambition than this government matched with much more decisive action.”