Electricity System Resilience (S&T Committee Report)

Lord Dixon-Smith Excerpts

Tuesday 3rd November 2015 Lords Chamber

[Lord Dixon-Smith (Con)]

My Lords, it is a privilege to follow the right reverend Prelate, because he reminds us, as we should not need reminding, that this industry is wholly about serving individual people. We of course are an unrepresentative bunch here, but the effects of the decisions that we can influence can be very profound for people across the whole country. I wish this evening to talk about something that we did not really get into in this particular debate.

We heard that we were able to get away with the low-reduction margin of electricity at present because the system was very diverse and, very complex, and, if there was a breakdown, it would affect only a small part of it. That meant that there was resilience, because if a small part breaks down, it is not the same as if, let us say, the new power station at Hinkley Point were to break down, because that would knock a large chunk of generating capacity offstream in one go.

One thing that we did not talk about, because it was not particularly helpful, is the amount of heat that the whole electricity-generating industry creates. It is remarkable that not least of the vital factors in running a major generating plant is how you cool it. We then produce electricity which we supply all over the country, to industry, commerce and private homes, a large proportion of which will be used to produce heat. Somehow, we have to escape from the historic trap that we are in because of the planning system. The old coal-fired generating stations, in particular, were pretty dirty places and caused a great deal of atmospheric pollution, which could affect local communities. Quite rightly, we put the generating plant as far away from people as we could.

We can now escape from that, and we need to look at the whole planning system so that we can bring our generating capacity to the very fringe of the communities it serves, if not actually within it. I hope that no one will be too surprised at this, but we used to have a wonderful generating station in Battersea. Part of the solution to the heat-generation problem was to use it to heat the houses in large parts of Battersea and a certain amount of Chelsea. We could considerably reduce overall electricity demand, I suggest, if we began to put our power, generating plant on the urban fringe or even in the urban areas on industrial sites.

There is a policy implication there that we rightly did not go into. I have no concern about the health implications of bringing, let us say, the Hinkley Point generator on to the fringe of London, although some people unquestionably might have. My view is set by the fact that a large and vital part of our Navy is now totally nuclear powered. We have men who live, apparently without any ill effect on their health or anything else, in a totally enclosed environment next to a nuclear reactor. I do not think we have a health issue if we start to bring plant such as Hinkley Point to, let us say, the fringe of London or even—although it is too late—Battersea Power Station. We would diminish the pressure for increased electricity generation at a stroke if that were to happen.

Rightly, we did not look at that during this examination, because we were looking at the way we are doing things now, but I hope that the Minister in his reply will acknowledge that there are policy aspects to this issue that need radical reconsideration. I hope that by the time my grandsons are my age, we will have a much more effective system and they will not be looking back and saying, “Why didn’t my grandfather and his generation, who knew there was this problem, do something about it?”.