Renewable Energy

With much attention focused on the potential for development of the renewable energy sector on our area it is understandable that there has been much comment locally about last week’s debate and vote in the House of Commons on the Energy Bill and MPs In-boxes have been filling up with ‘round-robin’ emails prepared by various campaign groups asking us to support a formal de-carbonisation target.

Though there were some longer versions most of these messages just asked that the Government set this target and all would be well. No thought seems to have been given to the impact on existing jobs or the inevitable increase in already high household and business energy bills. Like most issues this one is complex; not one that can be summed up in a couple of sentences.

Adopting the Target would have increased costs to every consumer in the country including the intensive energy users which is of particular importance here in northern Lincolnshire where, for example, Tata steel and the oil and petro-chemicals plants based along the Humber Bank employ thousands of people as well as hundreds working in power stations and the associated transport sector. Governments across the developed world are wrestling with the joint challenges of delivering energy security in a low carbon and affordable way. To deliver on those aims, we have to rebuild our energy infrastructure, making up for a dismal failure over past years to secure the necessary levels of investment. The Energy Bill that was approved last week is a vital instrument in securing that investment. Opposing a formal de-carbonisation target and supporting a low-carbon economy are not mutually exclusive. The case for the target is less about new low-carbon electricity generating plant - as there are other specific contractual measures in the Bill to deliver this - and more about the vital need to secure industrial jobs in the UK to build that infrastructure.

It is good for Ministers to challenge people to raise their aspirations and ambitions, and targets are part of that process, but they can only be relevant if we know how to meet them. The challenge with a de-carbonisation target for 2030 or any other date is that we cannot yet know how it can be met - or indeed, if it can be met. Nuclear may not happen on the scale hoped for - and it is hard to see how we can meet a de-carbonisation target without new nuclear. Many supporters of the target also oppose nuclear; the reality is that without nuclear the target, even if it could be achieved would be unimaginably expensive. Some of the emerging renewable technologies, such as offshore wind and tidal, may remain too expensive, and we don't yet know if their costs will come down to make them affordable for consumers. Carbon Capture and Storage, which could give a low-carbon future for coal and gas, has yet to be proven commercially. Unabated gas is relatively plentiful and is certainly lower in its carbon intensity than coal, but on its own would not enable us to reach the low level of emissions which the 2030 target would be likely to require. My difficulty with the target, therefore, is that we would be requiring it to be set without knowing that it can be met, and that cannot be a responsible decision for government to make, when the costs of getting it wrong would have to be picked up by consumers for decades to come. On the other hand, a target could clearly help secure the industrial renaissance a low-carbon economy could deliver. We all want to see jobs in the construction and the supply chain come to the UK, but companies are unlikely to invest unless they can see an order-book going well beyond 2020 and out to 2030.

Yet the de-carbonisation target does not deliver that certainty. Certainly, it says there needs to be new plant built, but no one can know which technology would deliver it. Investors will still require a clearer understanding of the likely market in the 2020s if they are to proceed, and so a clear agenda is more important than a general amorphous target. Moving on, I note that North East Lincolnshire Council is to reduce the number of council meetings and cost saving is given as one of the reasons. Sounds reasonable doesn't it? Or does it? Governments and councils don’t like scrutiny it shows up inefficiencies, is inconvenient, time-consuming and, if it exposes mistakes can be embarrassing.

When I was first elected a councillor in 1980, with the exception of some planning decisions almost every decision taken by a committee had to be approved or, equally important, rejected by the Full Council which met every month and meant that all councillors were involved in decision-making. During my time on the Council I always objected to more powers being delegated to committees or officers. When we elect our local councillor we hope and expect that he or she have some input into decision-making and preferably a vote on matters. Sadly accountability and democracy are being further eroded in North East Lincolnshire and that should worry us all