Storage of Carbon Dioxide (Inspections etc.) Regulations 2012

Duke of Montrose Excerpts

Monday 23rd January 2012 Grand Committee

[The Duke of Montrose]

My Lords, perhaps I may ask a further question of my noble friend. Will he ensure that the Scottish Executive is up to speed? Presumably they will have to pass similar regulations for their area. On inspections, the areas that he outlined were mainly to do with the injection of carbon dioxide. Will the regime also look at leakage from the storage site, or is that not a worry?

[Baroness Smith of Basildon]

My Lords, like other noble Lords I have a few questions and points of clarification. First, I welcome the Minister’s opening comments on CCS. He is looking puzzled and I am wondering what on earth I said. He reaffirmed the Government's commitment to a CCS project. He is nodding now, so I must be correct on that. Perhaps he could say something further. My concern is how, when the budget has been raided by the Chancellor and £1 million taken from it, the Government can fulfil that pledge. As the Minister has renewed the pledge, will he give us an idea of the timescale? We know that because Longannet was pulled there have been changes. Does the Minister have any idea of a timescale for when we will see the start of the first CCS project?

I will not labour the points on Scotland because they have been better made by other noble Lords. Have the Government given any consideration to the impact that a referendum on independence would have, and to whether the legislation would have to come back to this House or whether further legislation would have to be put in place? Do the Government have a plan B should that scenario come into effect?

The order distinguishes between routine and non-routine inspections. There will be regular, routine inspections, and if the regulatory authorities are made aware of potential problems, there will be non-routine inspections. I am not clear whether there will be a facility for spot checks: that is, unannounced inspections. If all inspections are announced, there will be time for facilities to get their house in order and make changes, whereas an inspector needs to see what is normal custom and practice in the association or organisation. If they are not aware of any specific problem and there is no routine inspection scheduled, can they make an unannounced spot check to ensure there are no problems?

The order talks about how an inspector would make a report and it would be made publicly available—in what format? Would local authorities in that area be informed that an inspection had taken place and what the results were? Would it be given to Ministers? How would we make the information about that inspection publicly available?

The order does not make clear how long it should take a company to comply with any requirement the inspector has made following an inspection. This is not an operation that can be shut down if there are any safety issues, so it seems very important that if requirements are placed on the operator, they should be undertaken as a matter of urgency. However, it does not say anywhere in the order what the timescale should be or if indeed the inspector would make a recommendation on the timescale. Given that the original inspection report would be made publicly available, would the requirement for compliance be made publicly available as well? If there were requirements made of a company and it had to fulfil certain conditions within a certain period of time, would that information be available in the same way—whether or not they had complied?

Finally, the bit that slightly puzzled me was under new Regulation 20, “Offences”, which says:

“It is an offence for a person … without reasonable excuse to fail to comply with a requirement imposed under Schedule 3”.

What is a reasonable excuse? How dangerous will it be not to comply with any requirements that are made? Should it therefore be an offence with strict liability; that is, whether somebody is mad, bad, ignorant or careless, it is still an offence not to comply with any requirement? I cannot think what would be a reasonable excuse not to comply with a requirement made following an inspection. If the Minister can say something on those points, it would help me to understand the order better.