Powys County Council needs to “reassess” its 2030 net zero deadline, with reaching the target in the next five years set to cost more than £400m.

At a meeting of Powys County Council’s Cabinet on 11 February, councillors discussed the annual update to the Corporate and Strategic Equality plan.

The updated draft of the plan which is also called: “Stronger, Fairer, Greener” covers the ambitions of the administration up to 2027.

To meet Welsh Government legal deadlines the latest version needs to be published by 1 April.

A joint meeting of all of the council’s scrutiny committees and Finance Panel held in confidential session had probed the draft document and produced 16 recommendations including that: “The net zero timeline needed to be re-assessed as a priority.”

The report explains that the plan is “responding” to the dual climate and nature emergencies and is now a central tenet to its strategic direction and staff are trying to make sure that it is “embedded” in the council’s work.

Cabinet member for a greener Powys, Cllr Jackie Charlton said: “I agree with the scrutiny recommendation that the timeline in achieving net zero needs to be reassessed.

“We have been working over the last couple of months at ways to address that and look at ways we can re-assess or support what we believed is a challenging target to get to by 2030.

“We have to have a considered debate on what we need to do and the way forward.”

In the drive to tackle climate change the Welsh Government has put local authorities in the 2030 net zero vanguard – everyone else will be expected to be carbon neutral by 2050.

Last summer it was revealed that the council would need to spend £447million to achieve net zero requirements and reduce the council’s carbon footprint by 2030.