Infrastructure Bill [HL]

Baroness Worthington Excerpts

Tuesday 14th October 2014 Grand Committee

[The Duke of Montrose (Con)]

My Lords, I must apologise to the Committee as I have not read the consultation response and so am not up on all the issues that have been looked into. I declare an interest as an owner of land in Scotland.

As we venture into this field of land at a depth of more than 300 metres and questions of ownership and interest, I just wonder whether all aspects have been looked at. One thing that is quite useful is that all coal, petroleum and so on are in the power of the Government but there is a chance that, once a shale extraction site has been established and there are large channels out under various properties, people may find that something else can be developed within that property. That might be coal gasification or something like it at deeper levels. I do not know how deep coal mines go in this country. I hope, with any luck, that they are not more than 300 metres but some coal mines are very deep indeed. One has to think of what effect establishing the shale gas network will have on other interests within the land.

I was very interested in the noble Lord, Lord Whitty, talking about the knowledge of the Environment Agency in monitoring this. In fact, it may well be that the skills that my noble friend Lord Borwick referred to in being able to detect deep drilling will become rather more vital. Presumably the Environment Agency can tell that drilling is more than 300 metres deep. It would be perfectly possible to drill a hole 300 metres deep and then put out side-feelers at less than 300 metres, saying “Oh, but we drilled to the depth we needed to”. That is where more surface problems might arise.

I guess that the question of why heat is not included in the Scottish powers is that we did not reserve heat to Westminster when we passed the Scotland Act. No doubt the Minister will tell me what the correct answer is on that. The other thing I thought of is this: supposing this network is established at great cost and somebody then does something to damage it—certainly an earthquake would damage it but you could not blame anyone for that—what rights do the owners of a shale extraction business have to their assets that are underneath other people’s property?

[Baroness Worthington (Lab)]

I will speak to the Government’s amendments to the Infrastructure Bill and to Amendment 95ZBE in my name. We have had an excellent debate this afternoon. The Labour Party’s commitment to environmental protection is absolutely steadfast. We have an excellent track record of delivering protection for the environment in government. We were the Government that passed the Climate Change Act and the Countryside and Rights of Way Act. We also established the national parks. There should be no doubt about our desire to enhance and protect our environment, and tackle climate change. That said, we do not oppose the extraction of new fossil fuels in this country on principle. However, we will insist that they respect environmental limits at both a local and global level.

I turn to the specific issue of trespass, which these clauses mainly address. They deal with a legal anomaly that was established relatively recently by legal precedent. We believe that this anomaly should be addressed and we do not agree that this somehow takes away a long-established right that people have held dear. It is certain that a legal precedent will be used to hold up the proceeding of geothermal and potentially fracking. People are saying that we need judicial scrutiny of each and every incident of fracking, but that seems to me quite an inefficient and wasteful use of judicial time when we have existing systems for ensuring that these projects go ahead under tight limits.

Equally, I have some sympathy with the numerous civil society groups that have now set themselves in opposition to fracking. My reason is that, unfortunately, this whole issue has been handled so appallingly badly that there is now a deep sense of mistrust and opposition, which is very genuine and heartfelt. Polling shows that as much as a quarter of the population is quite vehemently opposed to fracking, a quarter is supportive and a half does not care, but that first quarter will be vocal and will want to have its voice listened to. The opposition has grown because of the way that this matter has been presented to us. It was offered as a silver bullet to all our energy needs. We were told that this was going to drastically reduce costs and create a huge number of jobs, and that was the basis on which it was promoted.

I was very interested to listen to the Minister’s speech today, which was very different in tone. The emphasis was on energy security and climate change benefits relative to other sorts of fossil fuels. That is very welcome because that is the area where fracking has a role to play in terms of potential security of supply. It is certainly also true to say that, done well with the proper environmental protections, fracking, and fracked gas in particular, can have a significantly lower carbon footprint than imported sources of gas.

I think that there has been a certain amount of overhyping and a certain naive belief that we can look across the Atlantic at what has happened in the US and simply import it here. I am sure that those parallels have been drawn by various people in the Government. That is unfortunate because the US does not have a reputation for strong environmental regulation—quite the opposite. It has also until very recently set itself against action on climate change. Therefore, one can see how the Government saying that we are going to do what the US has done has necessarily upset people and caused them to be deeply suspicious. It is also true that we are in a world where we are trying to take action to tackle climate change, and this is a potential new source of fossil fuel which is being brought to the market and which would otherwise stay in the ground.

Therefore, I understand where the opposition is coming from on this but I do not think that the solution is to hold up this new source of energy through exploitation of an obscure trespass precedent. I think that the answer is to make sure that we have very strong environmental protections and regulations, and a number of the amendments that we have tabled today have been put forward with that precise aim in mind.

Our amendment is part of our attempt to introduce stronger environmental regulations for fracking for geothermal and gas. We will see fugitive emissions from fossil fuel activities but at the moment there is not really a government policy or an environmental approach to such emissions in this country. My noble friend Lord Whitty pointed out that we have been extracting fossil fuels onshore for a couple of centuries and that we have had some experiences. However, relatively speaking, climate change is quite a new thing and fugitive emissions have not been considered to be an issue before. There is of course monitoring of these facilities but mainly from a health and safety perspective. Companies do not like to have obviously dangerous concentrations of methane because it is potentially explosive, which is a health and safety issue and could damage equipment. There is an incentive for them to do that sort of monitoring but there is little incentive to do monitoring that relates to climate change. Our concern is that, overall, if we are going to see this industry develop—and I remain relatively sceptical that it will happen on the scale that some people hope—we should do this firmly in the knowledge that it must be monitored and managed in terms of our climate change targets and carbon budgets.

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Tabled by

[Baroness Worthington]

95ZBE: Line 16, at end insert—
“(6) No later than 6 months after the passing of this Act, the Secretary of State must, in consultation with the Committee on Climate Change, publish a report on fugitive green-house gas emissions from on-shore energy extraction in the UK.
(7) The report must include proposals for the measurement, monitoring, reporting and managing of existing and future fugitive emissions.”

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[Baroness Worthington]

My Lords, I am afraid that I am not reassured by the noble Baroness’s reply either, welcome though it was. It is good that this is being captured and possibly reported, but my point was that I do not think that it is capturing all the point sources as accurately as it could. More than that, somebody reporting emissions is not really the nub of the problem; it is managing those emissions down and ensuring that they stay within a carbon budget. I believe that the Government need to think again about whether they have a policy package in place to deal with fugitive emissions. I do not think that they do. Therefore, this amendment is important, but at this stage I am happy not to move it.

Amendment 95ZBE (to Amendment 95ZBC) not moved.

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Moved by

[Baroness Worthington]

95ZBM: Before Clause 28, insert the following new Clause—
“Shale gas extraction: baseline monitoring
(1) No shale gas extraction may take place before the operator has measured the baseline levels of methane in the groundwater over a 12 month period.
(2) After section 199(1) of the Water Resources Act 1991 (notice etc. of mining operations which may affect water conservation) insert—
“(1A) Notices under subsection (1) must, in the case of shale gas extraction, include baseline levels of methane in the groundwater.
(1B) Where a notice under subsection (1) includes baseline levels of methane in the groundwater, the Agency must issue a notice under subsection (2) requiring the levels of methane in the groundwater to be measured over a 12 month period.””

[Baroness Worthington]

I shall speak also to Amendments 95ZBN and 95ZBP. This carries on from where we left off in the last debate. As we said, we are absolutely committed to improving our environment and meeting our legally binding climate change goals. A key aspect of any new development, specifically an energy development based on fossil fuels, is that we need to ensure that the industry is set up in a way that is fit for the 21st century and the challenges faced by the 21st century.

We understand that this industry is really just getting going, but that is not the case everywhere. In the US, we have seen the industry grow very quickly with minimal regulation. That has been the cause of a high degree of concern. There are conflicting reports, but it seems that you can have increased methane emissions to air and groundwater from these activities.

Our first amendment would require that we get a handle on this issue and have a process for establishing a baseline of methane emissions to groundwater. Obviously, this is a complex issue and the exact wording of the amendment may not be precisely as it would need to be to address the problem. However, we have tabled it now because we are absolutely committed to ensuring that this is done in the right way. We hope that the Government can share that concern and goal. As I mentioned, the existing monitoring of methane is more geared towards health and safety than environmental concerns. That is what I allude to when I say that this must be governed in a way that is fit for the 21st century, where those global environmental concerns now have greater weighting than they have done.

There is obviously the question of how you go about the monitoring. Also, as touched on in the previous debate, there is the question of the cost. I hear anecdotally that the Environment Agency recently put in an application to the department for a sum of money to enable a very accurate form of laser monitoring to take place. That request for additional funds was declined. Are funds being made available so that the Environment Agency can do this job properly, so that we can start out on the right foot and ensure that we are using the best technologies that we know exist to get a good and accurate data set to enable us to manage this?

Amendment 95ZBN covers a number of different issues, beginning with the mandatory use of environmental impact assessments. At the moment, we know that the industry is volunteering to do environmental impact assessments for all fracking applications but we do not think that a voluntary approach is the right way forward. We also heard evidence from a number of groups that they see applications coming in that are conveniently sized at 0.9 hectares, which is just a tiny fraction below the statutory requirement. If you are a hectare in size, you must conduct an EIA. The RSPB made representations to us that it has been asked to comment on planning applications where no EIA has been shared with it. Even if the industry says that it is going forward on a voluntary basis, in practice it is not at all clear that that is actually the case. I suppose that the particular issue is that the footprint of fracking seen above ground is quite small but its impacts in terms of the wider local and global environment can be extensive. There is definitely a need for an EIA, irrespective of the size of the footprint of the site, because it has such potential extended impacts from its operation.

Among those impacts is the use of fracking fluids. This is another great difference between the UK and the US. In the US, there was minimal regulation: you could literally do what you liked and did not need to tell anybody. That has not given the industry a good reputation. We do not want that repeated here. There is a need to disclose the fracking fluids. Obviously, when they are a mile down they are perhaps not of huge concern to local populations, but they come back up and there is the question of their handling above ground. It is not just a question of saying that they are too far away for us to care about. These fluids obviously have to get into the ground, but then they come out again, so there needs to be proper disclosure. Only then can you build up the trust needed to get the social licence for these projects to go ahead.

The third element is that water companies should become statutory consultees. This touches on another and controversial aspect of fracking: its use of water. Water often powers the fracking and the demand for water is extensive. We are fortunate in the UK that, at certain times of year, we do not have a shortage of water, but at other times of year we do. We have the issue of abstraction from water courses. We would not want to see this industry exacerbate areas already under stress. I know that the industry will say that we are moving to recycled use of water, but in reality a significant proportion of the fracking fluid stays underground and does not ever come back, so recycling is only part of the solution. There is also the potential for pollution of wastewater and drinking water sources, so it is correct that the water companies should be statutory consultees on applications.

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I hope I have managed to convince noble Lords that we have taken and take very seriously the issues of public confidence and trust, and of ensuring that we do absolutely everything we can to monitor and report on this, keeping safety for the environment and local people at the forefront of all that is undertaken. I hope the noble Baroness will withdraw her amendment.

[Baroness Worthington]

My Lords, I thank the Minister for her response although, again, I am not wholly reassured. Particularly, one of her final comments served to illustrate why there is a level of distrust in the current approach. Put simply, if you leave it to the operators to do everything on a voluntary basis, including paying for all of this, where is your reassurance that it is done to the correct standards? Obviously, a profit motive drives this. Let us not try and beat about the bush. This is about not UK sovereignty of energy but shareholders and people making money. If you ask them to pay for monitoring, they will do monitoring in the best way they think fit. That may well be simply a handheld device or the very minimal level of monitoring, which will not be good enough to establish whether we have a problem, either in terms of establishing the baseline or keeping on monitoring against it.

[Baroness Verma]

Of course, the Environment Agency has to be satisfied. As the noble Baroness is aware, it is among the toughest of the regulators we have.

[Baroness Worthington]

Absolutely, but the noble Baroness will also be aware that it is under quite considerable pressure in terms of its budget. This is an additional new task that it is being asked to perform but is it being given the budget to do it properly?

[Baroness Verma]

Again, I apologise for intervening but I should like to reassure the noble Baroness that the Environment Agency has reassured us that it has adequate resources.

[Baroness Worthington]

Then perhaps my anecdotal point about the money being asked for in order to do the very best in laser monitoring is not true. Perhaps we can have some more correspondence about that before Report.

I will not dwell on this for too long. I think it is fine to say that we are going to take a risk-based approach but exactly how are we going to do this, what level of monitoring will be done and how are the Government going to keep monitoring all these voluntary approaches that are being proposed—voluntary EIAs, for example? The industry can say that but are the Government monitoring whether applications are going in at a local authority level without EIAs? I have certainly had representation from groups saying that they are going in without publicly available impact assessments. I hope that that is not the case but my sense is that the Government are taking rather a lackadaisical approach to this in thinking, “Well, if the industry says it’s doing it, it must be doing it, so that’s fine”. I am afraid that that is not how you engender trust.

I hope that more can be said about the role of the water companies as well. It is not just us who think that they should be statutory consultees; this is coming from Water UK. Therefore, it is certainly something that the Government should take seriously. Of course, if the water companies are required to make a response, they do not have to make it a voluminous response; it can be very short. However, they will then at least be part of the process and there will not be the potential for them not to be involved, which would severely weaken the level of information and knowledge that local planning officers have.

I shall leave it there. I am sure that we will return to this on Report but, at this stage, I am happy to beg leave to withdraw the amendment.

Amendment 95ZBM withdrawn.

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Moved by

[Baroness Worthington]

95ZBQ: Before Clause 28, insert the following new Clause—
“Application of emissions limit duty
In Schedule 4 to the Energy Act 2013 (application and modification of emissions limit duty), after paragraph 1(1)(b)(ii) insert—“(iii) substantial pollution abatement equipment dealing with oxides of sulphur, oxides of nitrogen, heavy metal emissions or particles is fitted to the generating station.””

[Baroness Worthington]

On to another topic, although a related one. Many of us in this Room today spent a good deal of time last year working on the Energy Bill. That received Royal Assent and passed into law and we are now working through the detail. One aspect of the suite of measures brought in under the Energy Act was an environmental performance standard. This was to be applied to new installations of large-scale generation and would bring in a limit on the amount of CO₂ per kilowatt that could be emitted by substations. In effect, it ruled out the building of new coal stations without CCS.

We had a good old debate about that and noble Lords may remember that we sought to amend that legislation to address what we considered to be quite a serious loophole. That was that, in applying these performance standards to new coal, there was a danger that old coal, which is less efficient, older and less reliable, would escape from such a regulation and people would then seek to continue in operation. Essentially, companies owning these assets would continue to sweat those assets for as long as they possibly could use whatever method they could. We warned that under the capacity mechanism—another key aspect of the Energy Act—such old coal plants would be able to receive generous amounts of money that would enable retrofits to be carried out to keep the plant limping along and meet the international environmental regulations. Therefore, we would see coal not only in the system for longer but operating at higher load factors than would otherwise be the case. During the debate, we were reassured that this was not a necessary provision and that everything was fine. Coal was going to be phased out and we should not worry our heads about it.

Why have we retabled this amendment? We have done so because, as we said before, half the projects under the Infrastructure Bill are energy related. We have to get a clear set of messages out to investors about what type of investment to pursue. Given that we are trying to solve quite a complex set of challenges, including moving to a lower carbon economy, there has to be a clear signal about the need for investment in low carbon. Unfortunately, the combination of the capacity market and the absence of any kind of EPS backstop on coal mean that there are conflicting signals.

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[Baroness Verma]

My Lords, I am grateful to the noble Baroness for tabling these amendments. I know that many of us heard the well rehearsed arguments during the passage of the Energy Bill. I agree with the noble Lord, Lord Whitty; I do not think it was four years, although it probably felt like four years. Whatever, we all got a lot of grey hairs from it—I remember that.

The measures in the Bill and our electricity market reforms have demonstrated that they are already working and starting to deliver new investment in electricity infrastructure: a clear demonstration of industry confidence. In April, we announced the allocation of the first contracts for difference to eight renewables projects. These projects included offshore wind, coal-to-biomass conversions and a dedicated biomass plant with combined heat and power. By 2020, these projects alone will be able to provide up to £12 billion of private sector investment, supporting 8,500 jobs, and could add a further 4.5 gigawatts of low-carbon generation capacity to Britain’s energy mix. This builds further on the major growth in the UK’s renewable electricity sector that we have seen, with capacity more than doubling since 2010 and with renewables now providing around 15% of our electricity. I wanted to point that out before I came back to the noble Baroness’s amendment.

We recognise that the intent behind the Energy Bill amendment was to achieve outcomes broadly consistent with those to which the Government are firmly committed. The potential uncertainties of applying the EPS in the way proposed by the amendment, on balance, pose risks that the Government should be unprepared to take.

The noble Baroness has already helpfully explained that existing coal-fired power stations will need to invest in fitting equipment in order to meet the requirements of the EU industrial emissions directive. That directive succeeds the large combustion plants directive and sets much more stringent limits on emissions of oxides of sulphur and nitrogen from 1 January 2016. However, I recognise that there have been a number of developments since last year as we have set about implementing our electricity market reforms.

I do not share the noble Baroness’s analysis of the current position or her prediction of the future. I am therefore not convinced that in the case of this amendment there is a need to revisit the conclusion reached by both Houses on this point less than a year ago. I do not think that I want to go back and rehearse the arguments made during the debate on the Energy Bill that led to the rejection of the amendment previously. They highlighted the risk that it could lead to a scenario where coal plants closed earlier than might otherwise be necessary to most cost-effectively achieve the decarbonisation of the electricity system. Were this to happen, the need for more generation capacity to be built earlier than we currently project could result in an increased cost to consumers. The noble Baroness may be prepared to risk imposing such unnecessary cost but I am not. The argument in recent months has been how consumers feel about the cost of energy.

I think there is almost unanimous consensus on the need substantially to decarbonise electricity generation by 2030. There is similar consensus that there will be little or no role left for unabated coal generation in future. However, we continue to believe that applying the EPS as proposed by the amendment is unnecessary and potentially a risky intervention to the market. It is our other EMR policies that will work to deliver the outcomes that we all wish to see but without risking our security of supply and ensuring that we are able to give consumers energy at as low a cost as possible.

The noble Lord, Lord Whitty, asked why we allow existing coal stations to participate in the capacity market. We do it so that the market ensures security of electricity supply at the least cost to the consumer. It is important to reiterate that all existing coal plants still need to meet their environmental commitments and will be subject to the carbon price floor. I assure the Committee that it is also about the fact that we have seen 7 gigawatts of new gas plant come forward seeking capacity agreement, which indicates that the capacity market is bringing on new investment.

I am not convinced that we need to revisit this argument. I know that the noble Baroness is absolutely committed to raising this issue again but I hope that I am able to convince her that the steps we are taking in the broader argument are ensuring that we are able to deliver at a cost value to the consumer and that security of supply remains, and that we remain committed to bringing on as much low-carbon energy as possible through the reforms that we have made in the Energy Act. I hope that on that basis she is able to withdraw the amendment.

[Baroness Worthington]

My Lords, I am grateful to the Minister for her reply. I am particularly grateful to the noble Lords who contributed. It is certainly true that the noble Lords, Lord Teverson and Lord Whitty, explained what the amendment does more clearly than I was able to do. For the avoidance of any doubt, we were simply seeking to limit the amount of time that old coal-fired power stations could run so that they did not provide base load power. That is the purpose behind it. It would not mean that they should shut or that they should not upgrade; it would simply mean that we had a mechanism for preventing them from base loading and thereby displacing otherwise clean capacity.

It is true that one of the cheapest ways of reaching a lower carbon intensity is to run your gas stations first and your coal stations as peaking plant; that is just incontrovertible. Every kilowatt hour produced with gas produces half the emissions compared with a coal station. In the act of upgrading these stations, those kilograms of CO₂ per kilowatt hour will increase. That is because it takes energy to run the filters. So we are taking an already inefficient station, making it less efficient and more carbon intensive, all apparently in the interests of keeping the lights on, when, in fact, we have seen that far more capacity than is needed is coming forward. This coal will displace investment in gas if that gas turns out to be more expensive. Therefore, it does not deliver on security of supply, and it does not deliver on cost-effectiveness because it forces us to do more of the more expensive things. We will have to decarbonise in other ways if we do not close coal, and that will be expensive. It is about cost-effectiveness, and that is why we want this amendment.

The Government do not have a coal policy. They do not have a plan for phasing out coal. Everyone can say fine words about it but coal stations are in the ownership and hands of the private sector. If they can make a profit from running these plants, they will. The Government put nothing into the Act dealing with EMR that stopped old coal—in fact, the reverse. They have created a new incentive, and by allowing firms to apply for three-year contracts the Government are paying them to upgrade. Eight gigawatts of coal is a lot of capacity. Eight gigawatts of new gas would engender a large amount of lower-carbon capacity that would be more flexible and, in the long run, cheaper and more reliable.

We listened with great care to the arguments put forward in the previous debate. The world has changed since then, not least—as my noble friend Lord Whitty pointed out—because policies have changed. The Government took the opportunity in the Budget, shortly after Royal Assent, to freeze the carbon price floor, which was a key defence mechanism. I shall not go on any further. This is a fundamental flaw in the Energy Act. I would like to revisit it, and I am not persuaded by the arguments that have been made. However, at this stage, I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.

Amendment 95ZBQ withdrawn.

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Moved by

[Baroness Worthington]

95ZCA: Before Clause 28, insert the following new Clause—
“Decarbonisation target range
In section 1(5) of the Energy Act 2013 (decarbonisation target range), omit all the words after “2030”.”

[Baroness Worthington]

My Lords, it is approaching 6 pm and we have been here for some time, so I do not propose to speak for long on this amendment. However, it relates to another important aspect of the Energy Act that we need to revisit. The Act’s first sections are about the need for decarbonisation. Indeed, that was the justification for all the measures that followed; we were about to embark on a process of decarbonisation, which was why we needed contracts for difference and to make all the interventions that we did. However, those sections are very oddly worded and actually prevent a decarbonisation target from being set until criteria are met. In effect, rather than setting a decarbonisation target, the Act prevents one from being set and ties the hands of a future Government. That is not good lawmaking and certainly, if there is a change of Government, we would wish to set a decarbonisation target as soon as possible to clear up the mess, and give the signal to investors that this is the target we are aiming for them to meet and that that is how they should make their investments. The provision in the Act is inappropriate, and this amendment seeks to delete the part that restricts the setting of a decarbonisation target and ties the hands of future Governments. It has no place in the Energy Act.

If it is true that the Government’s intention is to use the Act to decarbonise, why would you then restrict the decarbonisation target from being set? It makes no sense. Let us be clear that the Minister rightly pointed to some investments coming into renewables. That is being driven by a legally binding European target that expires in 2020. That is just around the corner in energy investment terms. There is absolutely nothing in the Government’s policies that means we will continue to do renewables—nothing, at least, that is legally established. If we see the continuation of opposition to all renewables on the basis that they are more expensive—when, in fact, their costs are falling rapidly—we could see that whole industry being undermined and stopped, post 2020, in the absence of any other target at a European level.

Now, I do not happen to agree with targets being needed at a European level on renewables specifically, but we need decarbonisation targets. We need a clear plan and to create the right investment climate so that people can make the right decisions—not the wrong ones. This amendment is simply to allow us to do that. Should we have a Labour Government in 2015, we are absolutely clear that we would set a decarbonisation target. We seek to move this amendment so as not to have our hands tied by what is a very inappropriate piece of legislation in the previous Energy Act. I beg to move.

[Lord Teverson]

Since we are in Committee, why did the noble Baroness not just delete the whole of subsection (5) altogether?

[Baroness Worthington]

That is a good question. In the interests of taking out the most annoying part of the Act, we restrict ourselves to simply removing the part that restricts us in the timing of when a decarbonisation order could be set. That is the reason.

[Baroness Verma]

My Lords, as I made clear during previous discussions on the Energy Bill—now the Energy Act—a decision to exercise this power is absolutely not something that should be rushed into or done in isolation. We had some very long discussions around this target so I will not go back and repeat those. But such a target would have a significant implication for the power sector, the so-called “non-traded” sector, for consumers and the wider economy. It is therefore vital to understand fully, based on evidence, whether a target represents the best approach to meeting our economy-wide carbon budgets cost-effectively and, if so, at what level it should be set.

It is for these reasons that the Government have maintained that the right time to consider whether to set such a target is in 2016. That is the point at which, in line with the requirements of the Climate Change Act, we will undertake extensive analysis to set the level of the fifth carbon budget in law which will cover the year 2030. This will allow us to consider the target in the context of the whole economy and what is required to ensure that the UK not only meets its 2050 emissions target but also remains competitive with other member states. In 2016 we will also have a better understanding of how the market will respond to the reforms that this House debated in the passage of the Energy Act and a clearer idea of EU and global climate change ambition. It is about timing. We laid out very clearly that 2016, in line with the fifth carbon budget, is the right time for this. I suspect that the noble Baroness and I will not agree here but I hope that at this point she will withdraw her amendment.

[Baroness Worthington]

My Lords, I do not propose to detain us any longer on this. I listened to that response. I sincerely hope that whoever is in government will set a challenging decarbonisation target in 2016. It would be better if we let the next Government make that decision but I am very happy to withdraw at this stage.

Amendment 95ZCA withdrawn.