Retrofitting Buildings: National Strategy

Debate between Baroness Bloomfield of Hinton Waldrist and Lord Lilley

Thursday 9th June 2022 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Bloomfield of Hinton Waldrist (Con)]

The noble Baroness makes a very good point that I shall definitely take back to my other department, the Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities—building regulations are really a matter for it.

[Lord Lilley (Con)]

My Lords, has my noble friend reviewed the pilot study carried out by the chief scientific adviser to the DCLG in 2019 on retrofitting a sample of social houses? It found that the average cost of doing this was £85,000 per house, but the reduction in emissions was only 60%. If scaled up nationally and if we take the heroic assumption that costs will be reduced by a factor of three, it would still cost £1 trillion. Have any of the proponents of retrofitting suggested where this money will come from?

[Baroness Bloomfield of Hinton Waldrist (Con)]

I draw my noble friend’s attention to Selly Oak’s project to retrofit many of its poor council houses. This is under way at the moment, but it seems to be having a much better result than the examples that he has just cited.

Clean Energy Transition Guidance

Debate between Baroness Bloomfield of Hinton Waldrist and Lord Lilley

Tuesday 8th June 2021 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Bloomfield of Hinton Waldrist (Con)]

I thank the noble Lord for his question and might write to him on some of the detail. I can say that the UK is a leader in ambitious climate action, both domestically, with the most ambitious emissions-reduction target in the group, and internationally, doubling our international climate finance to £11.6 billion from 2021 to 2025. This policy decision and its swift implementation demonstrate our commitment and, over the coming months, we will work closely with like-minded partners to see similar principles adopted elsewhere. When the Prime Minister launched the UK’s presidency of COP 26 in February last year, he pledged our ambition for COP 26 to be the point where the world comes together,

“with the courage and the technological ambition to solve man-made climate change”.

We want to see our policy act as a catalyst for others, while still providing finance for the right projects in countries that desperately need power.

[Lord Lilley (Con) [V]]

My Lords, if, as we are told, power from renewables is cheaper than power from fossil fuels, would this measure not be unnecessary, since no developing country would want to build fossil fuel power stations? If, however, that assertion about the cheapness of renewables is a fib, and our policy is to reduce the supply of cheap fossil fuel power and to force countries to rely on more expensive renewables, how will this help poor countries to develop?

[Baroness Bloomfield of Hinton Waldrist (Con)]

Solar and wind are indeed now cheaper than existing coal and gas power plants in most of the world. Investments in fossil fuels will become increasingly risky, including for developing countries. Shifting away from fossil fuels is compelling, from both a climate and an economic perspective. The priority for the UK is to support renewable energy as the default choice, enabling us to continue to support developing countries to meet their growing energy needs and increase access to electricity, in line with both the sustainable development goals and the Paris Agreement. The UK has launched the Energy Transition Council to bring together political, financial and technical leaders, but one still has to remember that 600 million of the population of Africa have no access to any electricity.

Ynys Môn: Economy

Debate between Baroness Bloomfield of Hinton Waldrist and Lord Lilley

Tuesday 2nd March 2021 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Bloomfield of Hinton Waldrist (Con)]

The noble Lord makes an extremely good point about trying to preserve the corporate knowledge within Wylfa and I will certainly take back this concern and proposal to the department. Wylfa still has the potential to be part of the north-west nuclear arc, along with the national thermal hydraulic research centre, the Trawsfynydd site for SMR, AMR and, potentially, medical radio isotopes, alongside Bangor University, which is a centre of excellence for nuclear studies.

[Lord Lilley (Con)]

My Lords, does the difficulty of finding a company to build a large nuclear power station at Ynys Môn not highlight the lack of nuclear expertise in this country—the first country to actually use nuclear for civil purposes. The one area where we do still have it is building nuclear units for submarines. Perhaps I might add my voice to that of the noble Lord, Lord West of Spithead, and ask my noble friend to consider a small modular reactor at this site; after all, additional modules can be added later.

[Baroness Bloomfield of Hinton Waldrist (Con)]

There are indeed design proposals that involve a number of small modular reactors on that site, and the Government believe that these will play an important role alongside large nuclear for low-carbon energy. As I have said before, the energy White Paper has put £385 million towards an advanced nuclear fund to support research and development into both SMRs and AMRs.

Heat and Building Strategy

Debate between Baroness Bloomfield of Hinton Waldrist and Lord Lilley

Tuesday 8th December 2020 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Bloomfield of Hinton Waldrist (Con)]

This is indeed a difficult area. The Government’s forthcoming fuel poverty strategy aims to reduce barriers to accessing support for households living in these sorts of home types, including park homes and similar. Many suppliers now provide the £140 warm home discount rebate to otherwise eligible households living in park homes through the warm home discount industry initiatives. Such households may additionally benefit from the green homes grant voucher scheme, which can provide up to £10,000 for low-income households in order to improve the energy inefficiency of their homes.

[Lord Lilley (Con)]

Can my noble friend confirm that the cost of installing heat pumps—£10,000 per household plus new boilers—will fall disproportionately on low-income households in the colder, northern parts of this country and least on the virtue-signalling better-off in London? She may recall that I voted against the Climate Change Act because its impact statement showed that the potential cost was twice the maximum benefit. What does the cost-benefit analysis of these measures show?

[Baroness Bloomfield of Hinton Waldrist (Con)]

I recognise the concern that my noble friend raises in his question. However, the cost of not decarbonising heat and developing greener buildings could be an awful lot greater if it falls on future generations. The benefits will be the ability to export green technologies developed in the UK, with support for many more jobs in the green economy. The Government already spend £1 billion per annum supporting poorer households through the ECO and the warm homes discount.

Agriculture Bill

Debate between Baroness Bloomfield of Hinton Waldrist and Lord Lilley

Committee stage & Committee: 6th sitting (Hansard) & Committee: 6th sitting (Hansard): House of Lords
Thursday 23rd July 2020 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Bloomfield of Hinton Waldrist]

I remind the noble Lord of the pressure on time. This is the Government Whip speaking.

[Lord Lilley [V]]

Sorry—I shall finish in one second. And allowing consumers to buy on the basis of cost.

Agriculture Bill

Debate between Baroness Bloomfield of Hinton Waldrist and Lord Lilley

Committee stage & Committee: 4th sitting (Hansard) & Committee: 4th sitting (Hansard): House of Lords
Thursday 16th July 2020 Lords Chamber

[The Deputy Chairman of Committees]

After the noble Lord, Lord Lilley, I will call the noble Baroness, Lady Worthington, who has requested to speak.

[Lord Lilley (Con)]

I congratulate my noble friend on being the only person in this debate who has raised the question of whether the net-zero target for agriculture is feasible. Does she agree that probably the most realistic assessment of realistic steps to achieve net zero is the report Absolute Zero by the Universities of Cambridge, Oxford, Bath, Nottingham and Strathclyde, and Imperial College, which said that even a massive expansion of forestry will have only a small effect? It therefore concludes that to achieve zero emissions from agriculture would require,

“beef and lamb phased out by 2050 and replaced by greatly expanded demand for vegetarian food.”

I hope she will make it clear to the House that if we accept these amendments we are mandating the end of lamb and cattle farming in this country.

[Baroness Bloomfield of Hinton Waldrist]

We are not accepting these amendments. I take my noble friend’s point. We should always have absolute zero as our goal because it will enable us to move as far towards that goal as possible.