Ill winds are blowing for Labour’s 2030 deadline for clean energy

Loss of the vast Hornsea 4 offshore wind project is bad news but it reveals a big flaw in setting a deadline

• Danish firm shelves huge UK windfarm project over rising costs

Immensely challenging" and pushing the limits of what is feasibly deliverable". That was the state-owned National Energy System Operator's description of its own proposals on how to decarbonise electricity generation in Great Britain by 2030. In short, it thought clean power by that date, a key Labour manifesto pledge, was credible" and achievable" as long as little went wrong along the way.

Neso's 200bn plan, detailing a rapid rollout of offshore wind, onshore wind, solar farms plus a major upgrade of the electricity grid, was adopted virtually unchanged by the government at the end of last year.