If Britain could turn the gale of initiatives coming out of 10 Downing Street into power, its climate challenge would be solved. Until that becomes possible, a more conventional approach will have to do.

The government has now published a white paper explaining how it intends to meet the carbon reduction goals set in its earlier “carbon budgets”. Its often self-serving way with numbers should inspire some scepticism. The 2012 “target”, of emissions 22 per cent below 1990 levels, is such a low-hanging fruit that it has already fallen, largely because of a shift from coal to gas and the emigration of dirty industry in the 1990s.