Eastern Link Undersea Cable Electricity Generation

Graham Stuart Excerpts

Tuesday 25th October 2022 Commons Chamber

[The Minister for Climate (Graham Stuart)]

I congratulate the hon. Member for East Lothian (Kenny MacAskill) on securing this important debate. The Government are leading the world on offshore wind. We have the most installed capacity in Europe. In our energy security strategy, we aim to go much further with an ambition of 50 GW of offshore wind and 5 GW of floating wind by 2030. As he knows and has set out, Scotland has a vital part to play and there are many green jobs around that work in Scotland.

[Neale Hanvey (Kirkcaldy and Cowdenbeath) (Alba)]

That suggestion simply does not stand up. The organisation Scottish Renewables has frequently told me that the best that the Scottish people can hope for from the renewables boom is to become service engineers for heat exchangers, which is simply not good enough. There are no meaningful jobs in construction or offshore maintenance in my constituency, which looks out at the Seagreen development off the Fife coast, so the Minister’s assertion is not borne out by the facts or the numbers.

[Graham Stuart]

I have a lot of offshore wind off my constituency as well. What we have done with the contracts for difference, and leading the world in the deployment of offshore wind, has been tremendous for increasing renewables and for transforming the economics of offshore wind. There are benefits not only domestically but globally, and there have been many jobs.

Given our global leadership, I share with the hon. Member for East Lothian the question of whether we have created as many jobs and as much of the industrial capability and community benefit as we would like; I leave that question in the air. My feeling is that in the expansion of offshore wind and the coming technologies, such as hydrogen and carbon capture, we must not just deploy at the lowest cost, but capture their wider value in the right way that balances and gives the best possible value for our constituents.

Scotland is home to Hywind Scotland and Kincardine—the world’s first and largest commercial floating wind farms, respectively—and Scotland’s plentiful supply of stormy skies holds vast promise. The Scotland Crown Estate’s recent ScotWind licensing round kick-started 20 new projects totalling around 28 GW of installed capacity—a frankly enormous figure. This is all sterling stuff, but increasing our renewable energy capacity is key for delivering on our net zero 2050 target, which I am sure the hon. Gentleman and the hon. Member for Kirkcaldy and Cowdenbeath (Neale Hanvey) would strongly support. It is also crucial for guaranteeing security of supply at a time when Putin’s appalling invasion of Ukraine threatens to drive up prices and drive down thermostats, because wind energy is not just renewable, but secure and increasingly affordable.

However, installed capacity is only one part of the story. One of the challenges we have to address is how to get the electricity we are generating to the households who need it. The stakes are high, because it is not just households; it is schools, hospitals and businesses too. Right now, there are significant network constraints between Scotland and England, and no matter how many kettles are boiling across Yorkshire, when the network is at full capacity, Scottish renewable energy generation, as the hon. Member for East Lothian laid out, has to be curtailed.

With more projects coming online each year, it is all the more vital that we transform our electricity network to unlock Scotland’s potential. That is why transmission links on the east coast joining our two countries are so crucial, particularly for projects such as Berwick Bank, off the coast of the hon. Gentleman’s East Lothian constituency, with connections in both England and Scotland. In July, Ofgem approved two of these links in their final needs case—one between Torness in East Lothian and Hawthorn Pit in County Durham, and the other between Peterhead in Aberdeenshire and Drax in north Yorkshire. These links will ensure that, before 2030, no Scottish renewable energy potential will go to waste, and they will reduce any potential constraint costs caused by limited capacity.

[James Cartlidge]

The fact is that these two connections —the Eastern Link—will cost £3.4 billion and carry 4 GW. At the same time, National Grid is insisting on going ahead with pylons from Norwich to Tilbury, which will despoil our countryside. It refused to consider offshore alternatives. We had to force it, kicking and screaming, to look at such options, and it finally came up with a cost assessment that is for 6 GW—not the 4 GW on the Eastern link, but for 6 GW—that would cost £3.1 billion undersea, which is less than the Eastern Link. Why are we not going to get the same sort of investment in East Anglia, given the huge delivery we are giving, from offshore wind?

[Graham Stuart]

My hon. Friend is truly an expert in this area and, working with colleagues, is working very hard to ensure that these arguments are heard and that the case is made to ensure that minimum disruption for the maximum facility and benefit is brought to his constituency and those around it.

The Government are working closely with Ofgem, the independent regulator, and industry to ensure our electricity network is ready to harness the power of renewables to deliver for consumers. Our approach is threefold. First, we are working to ensure that transmission infrastructure is planned in a co-ordinated way. In July, the National Grid Electricity System Operator published the holistic network design. This is the first ever strategic plan for the infrastructure needed to bring energy from offshore wind onshore. This streamlined approach will reduce the cost of construction for networks, which also means lower bills for families, including in Scotland. Consumers will save £5.5 billion in costs from 2030 over the network lifetime. By reducing the amount of infrastructure required, it will minimise disruption to communities and the environment too.

We are not just changing the way we build; we are also speeding things up. The Government have committed to reducing end-to-end timescales for the construction of transmission infrastructure by three years. To get to this goal, we have appointed Nick Winser as the Electricity Networks Commissioner to review the development process and identify where it can be made faster. Ofgem recently consulted on speeding up regulatory approvals of network projects, and we expect it to publish a decision later this year. Officials in my Department are working with those in the Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities to reduce planning timeframes as well. We will consult on how communities should best benefit from hosting grid infrastructure in their local area.

We are making the way we do things smarter and faster, but we are also exploring new solutions to storage, which the hon. Member for East Lothian mentioned, that promise to alleviate capacity constraints.

[Kenny MacAskill]

Does the Minister accept that there is a difference between how community benefit is dealt with regarding onshore and offshore wind? I assume that came about through a failure to appreciate that wind would ever go offshore. Is he prepared to meet me and representatives from East Lothian, and perhaps even Aberdeenshire, to discuss how we may accrue some benefit from that offshore energy, which currently applies only to onshore?

[Graham Stuart]

Like the hon. Gentleman, I have a vision of us leading the world, as we are, and continuing that up to 2030 and beyond, by greening our energy supplies and our whole society, and developing the industrial capability that I mentioned, together with the benefits of coming up with a holistic system that brings maximum benefit and thus carries everybody with us. Every community should be proud to host these developments, but should also benefit from them. I would be delighted to meet the hon. Gentleman were I to continue in this role, and if I do not he can try to hold my successor to that. He has made a powerful case and is, quite reasonably, looking to do the right thing.

One of the most genuinely exciting technologies in this area is long-duration storage, which, as the name suggests, stores electricity when it is not needed by users, and releases it slowly over time when demand is higher than generation. That could enable us to reduce costs by maximising our consumption of cheaper domestic renewable generation, enabling a more efficient seasonal balancing of the system. There is a real chance to save tens of billions of pounds between 2030 and 2050, and we can make sure that those Scottish storms keep Yorkshire’s kettles warm in winter, hopefully within a system that benefits all.

To do so, the Government are developing policy to secure investment by 2024. With that investment, we will be able to deploy enough long-duration storage to balance the whole UK system. We are moving full speed ahead to deliver a clean, secure, and affordable energy supply for all. Today’s debate has highlighted the critical importance of infrastructure in achieving that aim, and for ensuring that the interests of all communities that host or are near to energy production and transmission are understood and met. We want all to feel positive about the outcome of the world-leading effort that we are collectively making in England, Scotland and other parts of the United Kingdom.

Question put and agreed to.