Impact Assessments (IAs) are a key tool used by DECC to help understand and explain the effects of government proposals on individuals, businesses, the public sector and third sector organisations. They contain useful information on why the Government is proposing to intervene, the alternative options (both regulatory and non-regulatory) that have been considered, and the costs, benefits and risks associated with these different options. By helping policy makers think through the consequences of proposals, IAs ensure quality advice is provided to ministers and encourage public debate.
IAs are also essential in enabling government to develop policy and track progress towards the UK’s legally binding climate change targets. The main IA is supplemented by a number of specific impact tests including one to assess the impact of government policy on greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions. The GHG-specific impact test allows us to collect and monitor:
- information relating to absolute changes in GHG emissions
- information on the cost-effectiveness of the climate change policy landscape
This information is used to support future policy development and track progress on existing commitments under the Government’s carbon budgets. For more detail on this, see the carbon budgets web pages.
Policies in a broad range of areas may impact on GHG emissions and as such, the GHG-specific impact test may be relevant to many departments across government. DECC has developed a GHG impacts screening tool to help policy makers and analysts identify whether or not their policies have an impact on GHG emissions.
The Initial Screening Tool will help identify whether a full GHG Specific Impact Test should be carried out and it contains links to the official DECC-HMT guidance, which supplements the HMT Green Book policy appraisal guidance. Supplementary guidance for the full GHG Specific Impact Test can be found on the IAG guidance for policy appraisal web pages.
The table below provides a summary of all final-stage IAs published by DECC. You will find: