So how is the UK doing in cutting carbon emissions?

The excellent second report from the Committee on Climate Change was released this week. It shows that in 2009 the UK's carbon emissions decreased by 8.6 per cent.

There were a number of underlying factors for this decrease. UK GDP fell by five per cent, residential gas prices increased by 12 per cent and 2009 had fewer days of temperature below the heating threshold compared to 2008 (surprisingly given the very cold winter).

The overall message from the Committee is that this decrease shouldn't lead to complacency and a change of activity is required. As always the Committee was crystal clear about what changes are needed.

Some of these are already in the policy pipeline for the new administration including setting a carbon floor price, funding the demonstration projects for carbon capture and storage (although these should be extended to include gas), increasing investment in renewable, the electrification of transport and improving energy efficiency in the domestic sector.

There are, however, areas of uncertainty and potential weakness. Last year saw people shift their car purchasing decisions to more fuel efficient cars and the Committee suggested that the Coalition Government should seek to embed this change by altering Vehicle Excise Duty.

The Committee highlighted the length of time it is taking to secure planning for renewable energy projects (over 40 months for larger projects) and it is uncertain what implications the change in planning law will have on these and potential nuclear plants.

Finally, there are still areas of the economy where more policy drivers and support is needed, most notably the agricultural sector and small and medium sized enterprises.

Highly commended but no cigar

On Wednesday evening, I went to a black tie charity award event where we had been short-listed for two awards by Third Sector Magazine and the Charities Aid Foundation for our partnership with Sky.

Unfortunately, we didn't quite win but got second place "highly commended". On reflection this was probably a good thing because the Global Action Plan contingent were rather inebriated and I'm not sure we would have made it to the stage and the photographs would have been shameful.

Earlier in the week Lucy Carver from Sky and I had given a presentation about the partnership to an NCVO breakfast meeting. We have always been very open about the strengths and weaknesses of the partnership acknowledging the challenges as well as the successes.

What is increasingly obvious is how far-reaching the partnership is. We are now working with Sky on their supply chain communications, their future talent training, their in-house communications and their volunteering programmes.

One of the definite successes of the project has been our Appetite for Action school project. The awards for this were handed out during the week, one of which went to a fantastic school in Scotland where all 6 pupils are growing their own food, reducing food waste and cutting food packaging.