Renewable Energy Projects: Community Benefits

Debate between Angus MacDonald and Jayne Kirkham

Tuesday 15th October 2024 Westminster Hall

[Mr MacDonald]

I wholeheartedly agree. It should be the same for the transmission lines and the interceptors, for pumped storage and battery—really, the whole infra- structure of producing renewables.

So where is the 5% going to come from? It is really important that investors do not suffer from swings in British policy, and that they continue to invest in UK energy infrastructure. It is key that this increase is passed on to all consumers in the UK as part of a green tariff. My informed opinion is that paying that 5% to impacted communities would translate to about a 1.25% increase in electricity prices in Britain.

What should a council that receives that substantial amount of money use it for? Here are three examples of what has been happening already. One community fund near me gives £1,000 to each of the properties in the community. If 1,000 properties were given £1,000 each, that would be £1 million. Perhaps the locals managing the fund would allocate it to households that earn less than the UK median household income of £34,500. In any case, at a time of winter fuel allowance cuts, that would be most welcome. A second option is for the community to use the money to build affordable housing, and I know of a third community that injects money into its local care sector, for care homes.

Let me plagiarise the Highland council report in order to provide some context. In 2023, in the highlands, local communities received approximately £9 million. That is below the expected commitment based on Crown Estate Scotland’s guidelines, which suggest that developers should contribute £5,000 per megawatt, equating to £13.9 million. The total income from wind generation in the highlands for 2023 was estimated to be around £590 million. That calculation is based on a potential production of 11.8 GW. If all renewables—including hydro, offshore wind and pumped storage—were included, the benefit increased to 5%, and the amount of renewable energy doubled by 2030 to 22 GW, which is likely, then the community benefit would rise well above £50 million per year. That is a heck of a lot of money to highland rural communities. What would that be across the UK? £500 million a year? £1 billion? £5 billion over 10 years? This is a proper levelling-up fund for rural communities.

It was recently announced that two cancer wards on the island of Lewis in the Hebrides will share £4.5 million from a single offshore wind farm. That shows what can be achieved.

[Jayne Kirkham (Truro and Falmouth) (Lab/Co-op)]

Does the hon. Member agree that when we are looking at scaling up wind—floating offshore wind, for example, which will benefit Scotland and Cornwall, where I am from—we could look more closely at contracts for difference, and the licences and leases with the Crown Estate, in order to embed social value in them on a large scale and generate benefits such as apprenticeships or the building up of local supply chains? There are exemptions to the World Trade Organisation rules and so on, and we could manage to do that in quite a substantial way.

[Mr MacDonald]

I was a Highland councillor for quite a few years and sat on the planning committee. We heard application after application promising a large number of jobs and a large amount of local buying, yet we did not see that, but I do think we need to tighten up a great deal what is being offered in all the different aspects of renewables.

I have been looking at the situation overseas. In Denmark, new renewables projects must offer at least 20% ownership of their overall venture to local residents. In Germany, there is a local tax on renewables. In Heligoland, an archipelago in the North sea, three offshore wind farms were built in the mid-2010s, and the tax revenue taken in by the municipality was €22 million in 2016 alone. In Ireland, the contribution to community benefit fund is to be set at €2 per megawatt-hour of generation.