National Policy Statements

Ian Swales Excerpts

Wednesday 1st December 2010 Commons Chamber

[Charles Hendry]

The Government are committed to taking us forward, and I welcome my hon. Friend’s support in that respect. Hydro has an important contribution to make. The Minister of State, Department of Energy and Climate Change, my hon. Friend the Member for Bexhill and Battle (Gregory Barker), who has responsibility for climate change, set out how we can hope to achieve that ambition in his recent speech on the subject. Most issues that we are discussing today relate to major applications of more than 50 MW. Most hydro schemes will fall below that threshold and will therefore be subject to local planning decisions.

The section of the energy policy statement that deals with renewable energy does not cover major hydro schemes, such as major schemes involving tidal flow, because at this stage there is no evidence of a serious application for such a scheme of more than 50 MW. If that happens, we will need either to review the national policy statement or to introduce one specifically for marine technologies. In this country, we have a network of rivers, which are a potential source for electricity generation that we are keen to see harnessed.

[Ian Swales (Redcar) (LD)]

The Minister has discussed the urgent need for new renewable electricity generation capacity. If that is the case, why is the banding review of renewables not reporting until August 2012 with implementation in March 2013? Will he consider speeding up that process, so that we can get the capital that is waiting for, for example, biomass power stations released and get such projects under way?

[Charles Hendry]

One of the issues for investors in this area is certainty. They want to be able to plan for the long term and to know what rate of support they will get under whatever mechanism is in place. A date of 2013 enables people to plan a transition to whatever the banded level will be after that. I understand the need for early clarity, and if there are ways we can provide that, we shall seek to do so. We seek to work constructively because we understand that the alternative can be a hiatus in investment, with investment dropping off for a period of years in advance of the threshold and the level of support changing. It is important, in terms of national interest, to have a continuous flow of investment.

I turn now to the issues that have been covered in the energy national policy statements. Perhaps it would be helpful if I briefly set out the purpose of the documents before us today. The revised draft energy national policy statements consist of a suite of six national policy statements and a number of associated documents. They are not intended to set out new energy policy. They are consistent with and explain current energy policy and how it relates to the planning consent process. Similarly, we are not using national policy statements to change the standard for consenting projects. They neither raise nor lower the bar on how a major energy infrastructure project is examined and consented. They are there to explain how such decisions should be made. They set out the consenting policies that need to be considered in the examination of major energy infrastructure and the decision on whether to grant or decline consent. At the same time, they will ensure that new major energy infrastructure projects respect the principles of sustainable development. They will allow not only the Infrastructure Planning Commission but developers and local residents to see the basis on which applications must be considered.

There is an overarching energy national policy statement that sets out the Government’s policy on energy and energy infrastructure development; an energy need statement on the need for new nationally significant energy infrastructure projects; the assessment principles that need to be taken into account in examining and deciding on proposals for energy infrastructure development; and generic impacts for all energy infrastructure, and how they should be assessed and mitigated to ensure that the right balance is reached between securing our energy needs and protecting the environment.

There are also five technology-specific energy national policy statements, covering fossil fuel electricity generation; renewable energy infrastructure, which deals with onshore wind, offshore wind and energy from biomass and/or waste; gas supply infrastructure and gas and oil pipelines; electricity networks infrastructure; and nuclear power generation.