A recent article on the Conversation website, titled “Net zero will transform Britain’s economy – our map reveals the most vulnerable places”, briefly gave me hope that those who write about climate change and Net Zero for The Conversation website might be beginning to realise that the situation is a little less straightforward than previous articles there have suggested.

We hear a lot about a “just transition”, of course, but it never seems to happen. And so I was pleased to see it being recognised that Net Zero isn’t all good news, and that for some it most definitely represents bad news:

Here’s an uncomfortable truth: even as Britain makes the welcome [sic] transition to net zero, some communities will lose jobs and face economic disruption. And the places most exposed are overwhelmingly the same places that were hit hardest by the wave of industrial job losses in the 1980s….Many places already struggling after decades of industrial decline are poised to face disproportionately sharp economic shocks as decarbonisation reshapes the employment landscape….

…These communities were once anchored by industries such as steel, chemicals, heavy manufacturing and mining. As those sectors contracted from the 1980s onward, these places experienced deep job losses and long-term economic scarring.

Today, the same areas remain heavily reliant on manufacturing sectors that are once again undergoing radical change – this time driven by climate policy, alongside globalisation, tariffs and high energy costs. In these places, decarbonisation is colliding with existing economic forces, raising the risk of further job losses and industrial decline.

I hail from one such area, that suffered long decline through the twentieth century, before being kicked in the teeth by Thatcher’s government, and now being kicked while its down by a Labour government that really ought to know better (and in its own interests, really ought to do better, if it doesn’t want to be wiped out at the next general election). Hats off to the authors, Ed Atkins and Sean Fox, for recognising that there is a substantial problem here.

However, thereafter my plaudits cease. The article goes on to say “Net zero will bring vast economic benefits to many.” The claim is dubious, and not particularly well-evidenced. The article goes on to say “The net zero transition can create new, secure, well-paid jobs”, and this statement comes complete with an embedded link, ostensibly to support the claim. My problem with the embedded link is that I suspect many readers won’t bother clicking on it, and will simply accept that it must mean there is good evidence to justify the statement. However, the link is in fact to nothing more than an estimate in July 2025 of UK “green jobs” made by the Office for National Statistics (ONS), which it makes clear are “official statistics in development”. It’s over six months out of date, and if the green jobs were coming thick and fast, one might have expected a crowing update. There isn’t one, however, and the date of the next release isn’t provided, simply waiting “to be announced”.There is actually a “Green jobs team” at the ONS, so it’s not surprising that they spend their time looking for “green jobs” to announce. However, their methodology doesn’t convince me, and I’m disappointed that the authors of The Conversation article didn’t dig into controversial claims regarding so-called “green jobs”, rather than simply embedding the link to this page.

The ONS claims that in 2023 (surely there must be more up-to-date statistics?) there were 690,900 full-time equivalents (FTEs) green jobs. More than half of these, however, were accounted for by just three sectors: waste, energy efficient products group, and renewable energy. While the latter two groups might qualify as “new green jobs”, it’s difficult to see how the former group’s jobs so qualify. Waste has to be controlled and disposed of whether or not we are “transitioning” to Net Zero. Furthermore, “waste” was the largest employer, with 158,400 FTEs, representing 22.9% of all green jobs in 2023”. These are not “secure well-paid jobs” created by the Net Zero “revolution”. They are existing jobs being re-labelled for propaganda purposes – old wine in new bottles, if you like. And so it goes on. Other jobs categorised as “green” include those in environmental charities and those associated with repairs. The latter are certainly laudable, but neither can be said to be due to Net Zero policies.

Next, The Conversation article claims that the “net zero transition” can help the UK establish itself as a clean energy superpower. I was surprised to see such hyperbolic political language being used in the article, but I was less surprised when I clicked on the embedded link that attempts to justify the claim. Having done so, I found that it took me straight to a propaganda page on the website of the Prime Minister’s Office. It provides no hard data to back up the claim, and I am disappointed to find it inserted without caveats in the article.

As I carried on reading, it occurred to me that the article isn’t sending a warning about the dangers of Net Zero policies to the UK, its economy and its people. Rather, it’s striking a warning note, advising policy makers to tread warily, lest Net Zero loses public support. It cites (via another embedded link) a YouGov poll suggesting that while the UK public still supports Net Zero, “there is much more limited public appetite for the kinds of policies that would help achieve it”. Reform UK has pledged to scrap Net Zero policies and (horror of horrors) has even suggested the revival of coal mines, while the Conservatives have vowed to do away with the 2050 target.

The authors are concerned:

Continued public support for net zero depends on acknowledging where its costs will fall. Confronting these risks is essential to making climate policy more durable.

There is no conversation around the economic and environmental wisdom (or otherwise) of continuing with Net Zero policies. Their necessity and beneficial effects are simply assumed, albeit with some nervousness regarding the increasing evidence that they are causing major problems for some. The worry seems to be less about the problems, than that the problems, unless ameliorated, might see support for the policies decline. That would never do!

Still, the good thing about the Conversation is that it allows comments below the line. Ironically, given the website’s name, authors of articles don’t always respond to comments. Credit where it’s due, however – in this case the authors did respond, though not fully. There weren’t many comments, and consequently there wasn’t much in the way of response from the authors. The section below the line on which I want to focus is with regard to comments by Robin Guenier, and the responses by Professor Fox.

Robin weighed in with:

There’s nothing to be welcomed about a transition that means Britain is legally obliged to pursue this unachievable and disastrous policy – a policy that imperils our national security, is on course to wreck our economy and is having dreadful and worsening environmental consequences.

And he went on to point out that as the UK is responsible for only 0.7% of greenhouse gas emissions, and countries responsible for more than 80% of emissions don’t regard emissions reduction as a priority, so the policy is pointless.

Professor Fox replied very politely (full marks for that), and acknowledged that many people feel the same way, though he didn’t agree. He said (I paraphrase, I hope not unfairly) that we have a moral duty because of our cumulative emissions: “as the data shows, until 1882, more than half of the world’s cumulative emissions came from the UK alone.” He backed this up with a footnote linking to the website of Our World in Data. But 1882is a long time ago, and I would suggest that it’s meaningless, and indeed misleading, to rely on such emotive yet irrelevant information. Robin responded by pointing out that as we’ve already cut our emissions, what further action can we usefully take? And he added: “It’s surely obvious that further reductions by us – because of perceived moral obligation or otherwise – would make no discernible difference to the global situation?” Had I got involved in the discussion, as I would have done had I had the time to do so before it closed to comments, I would have gone further and referred to two of my own articles which I believe provide valuable context when it comes to dealing with moralising claims of this nature: Gimme, Gimme, Gimme! and The Sins of the Fathers. In a comment under the latter article, I made the same point (using slightly different wording) as Robin made to Professor Fox, as to:

…what I regard as the lack of logic associated with obsessing about responsibility for past emissions while being anxious to avoid blaming those countries who are responsible for the bulk of ongoing emissions today. After all, if we really are facing a climate emergency with numerous tipping points being imminent, then surely the imperative is to rapidly reduce the ongoing emissions. Yet CarbonBrief [for my piece was about a CarbonBrief article] seems anxious, with its torturing of statistics, to give today’s biggest emitters a free pass, while beating up those responsible for some (but by no means all) of past emissions…

By the way, when it comes to cumulative emissions, even according to Carbon Brief, the UK lies just in 8^th place, behind the USA, China, Russia, Brazil, Indonesia, Germany and India, with Japan and Canada not far behind.

In response to Robin’s pushback, Professor Fox replied, again very politely, to say that he and Robin would be unlikely to agree, but then said that both the UK’s historic and per capita emissions justify action. Robin responded by pointing out that:

Global average emissions are 6.56 t GHG/cap and ours are 5.63 – i.e. less than the global average. Yet for example China’s are 10.81 – i.e. 92% greater than ours. And about 50 other developing countries also have per capitaemissions that are greater than ours, some much greater. So how does this justify ‘action’?

Professor Fox then trotted out the old canard to the effect that “even some of the biggest emitters, including China, are moving fast to decarbonise their economies…”. Robin effectively dealt with that claim by himself referring to a chart from the website of Our World in Data showing the growth in China’s coal consumption. Had I got involved, I would have referred to my article: They’re Behind You!, which tries to set out the extent to which China is responsible for greenhouse gas emissions, yet seems to get a free pass from commentators (as well as being the biggest emitter by a country mile on an ongoing basis, it’s also in second place with regard to cumulative emissions).

Having referenced the growth of renewable energy in oil-rich Texas, Professor Fox suggested that “[t]he future of energy is clearly renewables – especially as they become cheaper than fossil fuels.” This time he didn’t provide a footnote and a link to back up this claim. Robin’s response suggested that the claim may be doubtful:

I believe the fact that, despite vast sums invested in them, solar and wind represent only 3% of global primary energy and fossil fuels (85%) are continuing to increase year-on-year suggests otherwise.

Again, Robin referenced Our World in Data.

Professor Fox acknowledged that UK energy prices are too high, and that this is a drag on the economy, but he repeated the commonly made claim that that this is because of our reliance on natural gas and the way this influences energy prices across the market. In support of these claims, he referenced a CarbonBrief article and a Lumify Energy article. I would have been happier had he referenced more objective sources. CarbonBrief is an organisation that lobbies for Net Zero, and specialises in providing useful sound bites that can be endlessly repeated by sympathetic politicians. I have taken aim at its work here. Lumify Energy, by its own admission, is an organisation that exists to help landowners make money from renewable energy projects (“Since 2014, we’ve helped landowners up and down the country to get the most out of their renewable energy site. Using our industry expertise and data technology, we work to develop bespoke solutions for your renewable projects.”). He also referred to a Report of the House of Commons Energy Security and Net Zero Committee. Whilst such a Report might be considered more objective, it is nevertheless problematic, not least for its failure to understand that the whole system costs of renewable energy make it much more expensive than fossil fuels. Robin responded by reference to a Watt Logic report:

Policymakers are also fond of blaming “high international gas prices” on the UK’s high energy costs. However, this claim also does not survive closer scrutiny. Firstly, there is no single “international gas price” – there is not even a single British gas price! However, what policymakers mean by this expression is that, as net gas importers, we must pay whatever prices are demanded by the international gas markets.

But this is true for all net gas importers, many of whom, like the UK, use gas as the fuel in their marginal electricity generating plant. So while “international gas prices” may explain periods of higher energy prices in the UK, they do not explain why the UK has relatively expensive energy compared with other countries. This additional expense undermines the UK’s international competitiveness and is driving de-industrialisation.

And that was pretty much the end of the conversation. To my mind it’s a pity that neither of the authors commented further with regard to Robin’s well-aimed arrows in response to Professor Fox’s comments. Perhaps they ran out of time before comments closed. Perhaps Robin’s points won the day.

Whatever the explanation, the end-point is disappointing. The discussion was just warming up (and that’s more than can be said with regard to comments below some articles at The Conversation). A useful discussion might have followed between intelligent and well-informed people with differing views regarding this topic, a discussion that could have been of interest and of value to readers who simply wish to understand the issues better. Unfortunately it petered out before it got going. The Conversation, sadly, doesn’t seem to do meaningful conversations.