They recommended that the Government aims to cut emissions by at least 60% by 2030 to ensure that the UK is on track to meet the 2050 target, with Parliament to debate the contents and proposals of this report before the summer's recess.

On 15 October 2018, Energy and Climate Change Minister Claire Perry formally wrote to the CCC requesting advice on a date for achieving net zero greenhouse gas emissions across the economy.

[9] This came seven days after the publication of a special report by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) on the impact of global warming of 1.5 °C above pre-industrial levels.

[10] The Government formally accepted the recommendation from the CCC (965Mt of Carbon dioxide equivalent in the budgetary period 2033 to 2037) in April 2021,[11] and Parliament passed the relevant statutory instrument in June 2021.

[13] Under the Paris agreement signatory countries have discretion to set their own NDCs, and some environmental activist groups had previously called for a UK NDC of a 75% reduction, whilst Professor Lord (Nicholas) Stern (speaking in an academic capacity as chair of the Grantham Institute at the London School of Economics) had suggested 70%.

[14] The Prime Minister Boris Johnson made the 69% commitment the same day as the CCC published its recommendation (3 December) and stated "We have proven we can reduce our emissions and create hundreds of thousands of jobs in the process.

The committee was criticised in 2020 by George Monbiot for what he called its target culture, and for emphasizing planting trees commercially for bioenergy with carbon capture and storage instead of letting them regrow naturally as part of rewilding.

Implementing of loft and cavity wall insulation, boiler replacement, new car efficiency, investment in renewable power generation, and waste emissions reduction was stated to be in good progress.

The macroeconomic analysis is based on a Post-Keynesian model, and suggests that UK gross domestic product will be 2-3% higher in 2050 under the pathway relative to a baseline of the continuation of existing policies.