Revised Energy National Policy Statements

Lord Teverson Excerpts

Tuesday 22nd February 2022 Grand Committee

[Lord Teverson (LD)]

My Lords, I welcome this document. I remember some 10 years ago sitting here and going through all six of the previous documents. It does not seem so long ago, which is a sad fact, but there we are. It is right that a lot has changed since the statements first came out during the coalition Government.

I do not want to talk particularly about net zero; I want to talk about the other emergency that we have and ask a number of questions on it: the biodiversity emergency, and how that relates to the national policy statement. There are some specific questions that I want to ask at the end. I welcome the fact that biodiversity is mentioned quite a bit—I have mainly gone through the overarching document—but I do not understand how the Environment Act that we passed at the end of last year relates to biodiversity net gain in terms of nationally significant infrastructure projects. Paragraph 4.5.2 of the overarching document states:

“Although achieving biodiversity net gain is not an obligation for projects under the Planning Act 2008, energy NSIP proposals should seek opportunities to contribute to and enhance the natural environment by providing net gains for biodiversity.”


Yet Schedule 14 to the Environment Bill, which is about biodiversity net gain, states:

“The biodiversity gain objective is met in relation to development for which planning permission is granted if the biodiversity value”


is attributable to the percentage, which, as we know, in the Environment Act is 10%. Given that the Environment Act, primary legislation passed only at the end of last year, relates biodiversity net gain to a planning permission —and I understand that NSIP is a planning permission— does the 10% net gain apply to such projects? Is that true also of marine projects? In any case, even if the Environment Act does not apply to them, does the Secretary of State expect that marine projects will also create biodiversity net gain?

It is great to go on about biodiversity net gain, but, as we know, there is a requirement in the Environment Act that such net gain be protected for at least 30 years. That has to be done by local authorities, as I understand it from the Environment Act, but when it comes to NSIPs, who is going to make sure that net gain that is promised as part of NSIPs’ planning permissions is actually delivered through that period of at least 30 years? If that policing and enforcement do not take place, we know that it will not happen or will disappear along with everybody’s corporate memory of the original agreement. I would be very interested to understand the Minister’s idea of that. I am sure that both he and I have exactly the same objectives in that area.

On a similar environmental theme, I could find no mention within the documents of the circular economy. This is one of the other areas that government is starting to get involved in and where it is starting to see that, rather than a linear economy, we should move to a circular economy in terms of global resources. How will the Government start to look at that in terms particularly of renewable energy as well as all the other areas that there are? On renewable energy, we have got as far as looking at wind turbine blades, but that is about as far as it goes, and I do not think that the industry has been fully responsible yet in that area.

On waste disposal, the noble Lord, Lord Whitty, was absolutely right. I know that the Government are doing a study on networks of offshore wind pipelines and energy cables; it is particularly important, as development starts in the west, in the Celtic Sea, to understand what is going to happen, so that we do not have the sort of spaghetti junction that we have in the North Sea.

I also want to comment briefly on nuclear waste. I was disappointed that EN-6 was not actually updated. I think that the Minister may reply by saying that it is in process, which, if so, is fair enough. But on page 16 of the original EN-6, the footnote, which I thought was a typing error when I first read it, says:

“Geological disposal of higher activity waste from new nuclear power stations is currently programmed to be available from around”—


wait for it—“2130”. That is still 120 years away, and I wonder whether the Government would like to reconsider that and maybe bring it a little forward. The document does say at the end, to give it its due, that they—this is the coalition Government—might see

“potential to bring forward this date”.

I shall put it in my diary to check if it happens by then, but it would be great if we could bring it forward.

Lastly, I again checked “energy security” on a phrase checker, and it came up with “text not found”. The document does mention energy security, but only in relation to two things. One is the capacity market, all around the area that the noble Baroness, Lady Neville-Rolfe, mentioned—keeping the lights on—which the capacity market is very much about. The other area is cyberattacks, which as we know are very topical and important. But there is nothing on what we would understand more broadly as energy security in this overall document, and I find that quite an interesting omission.

I look forward to the Minister’s reply, particularly in the area of who is responsible for making sure that biological and biodiversity net gain actually happens over the next 30 years for this level of project.