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With previous plans, it has been very difficult to understand what is happening in some sectors, as there has been a lack of data and information. It is felt, rightly or wrongly, that, because there is a lack of data on farming and land use, for example, and a lack of clarity as to what individual actions will do to reduce carbon emissions, certain sectors are almost being given a bye or being let off. In other sectors, however, such as transport or heat in buildings, it is very clear what certain actions will do to reduce carbon emissions. How do we bring the data up to a point where we can understand exactly what is happening across different sectors and exactly what the various measures will achieve? There seems to be a bit of fuzziness in some areas around what making a change might result in—people are not exactly sure.

Generally speaking, PFOA is not available in a wider market. There is just the single exemption that we are discussing today, so I will turn to that matter. Is it the case that the Ministry of Defence or defence-related contractors apply for exemptions from environmental regulation? On the face of it, if you are a civil contractor wearing protective clothing, the use of PFOA in that clothing would be banned, whereas if you are working in a defence-related sector or industry, its continued use is allowed. Therefore, there is a bit of divergence between the situation for people who are working in defence-related industries and the situation for people who work in civilian areas, where there is no exemption for that chemical. It might be a minor divergence, but I wonder how those issues are discussed and resolved. Is it something that you just have to accept—that is the decision that the UK Government has made on that—or is there a protocol with the MOD or defence sector more generally around lower or different environmental standards?

I am happy, unless Dan has anything more to say.

Thanks for that.

The last area that I want to ask you about is negative emissions technology—comprising bioenergy carbon capture and storage—BECCS. The Climate Change Committee highlighted the continuing uncertainty around that. Around a year or two years ago, it recommended that there should be a plan B, which is very challenging. How do you respond to that?

My understanding is that, in the past, there has been a memorandum of understanding between the Scottish Government and the Ministry of Defence on a range of areas, most notably environmental compliance, habitats regulations, environmental management and that side of things. Obviously, this strays more into health and safety. It is clear that there is environmental compliance in the Ministry of Defence, but scrutinising that is pretty hard. This is another example of that. Such examples come up from time to time.

Great. I will go back to the points that Phil Raines raised around critical detail, which was a feature of the UK CCC’s comments. Can you give us a bit more explanation? When it comes to the individual policies listed in the climate change plan, will it be really clear what the expected reduction in emissions will be, and what underlying modelling and assumptions have been used? In previous climate change plans it has been almost impossible to see what is going on behind the assumptions, particularly because of the use of the TIMES model. Previous cabinet secretaries have said that it is incredibly complex and they cannot explain it because it is a big computer model.

How clear will the plan be to people looking through it, in particular for sectors that will have to make quite big reductions in emissions and respond to the opportunities around heat and other areas?

Okay. Am I right that its use will be phased out by 2025 anyway?

Does that mean that aviation emissions are going to drop—just as they are going to have to drop on the A9 and A96 and in farming and every other sector of our economy—or are they going to grow?

So it could be that other sectors or other parts of the transport sector might need to have steeper reductions in emissions in order to deliver the benefits that aviation—[Inaudible.]

I will move to Seona Shand, on a similar theme. Reading your submission, it is obvious that there is a lot of excitement among business about the business opportunities of COP28. I think that you say that it is one of the largest global moments. Business will be trying to make sense of those opportunities in the same way that it did with the Dubai Expo 2020.

In relation to the COP process, at one level, COP26 in Glasgow felt like a big trade show. That is not to diminish the importance of that, as it is clearly served an important function, but it raises questions about credibility in relation to the business sector’s engagement in the COP process. It is about where you draw the line. When I was wandering around COP26 and looking the hundreds of stands that there were in Glasgow, I saw some stands from countries that were clearly stretching it in terms of credibility in terms of the kind of businesses that were being presented, the genuine sustainability of some of the offerings and what the countries were wanting to promote from their own individual sectors.

I wonder how you find that line of credibility within Scotland. Is COP28 an opportunity for everybody to come and present their goods and services? Are there particular key themes where the Scottish Government will say, “Look, this is our contribution in relation to climate change in terms of goods and services”, but there may also be others that are more questionable? I certainly saw some questionable promotion at COP26, which was widely described as “greenwashed” by others.