Infrastructure Planning (Electricity Storage Facilities) Order 2020

Lord Grantchester Excerpts

Tuesday 27th October 2020 Grand Committee

[Lord Grantchester (Lab)]

I thank the Minister for her clear explanation of the order before the Committee. This simple order, which corrects an error from the Energy Act 2016, will make a key difference in the development of much-needed battery storage for the development of renewables and the pursuit of net zero. I am happy to approve the order in that respect.

The threshold of 50 megawatts for determining the avenue of planning requirements was always an impediment to progress. It is disappointing that the Government had to wait for the outcome of linked strings of 49.9 megawatt facilities to appreciate the position— a lesson that took the Government four years to appreciate.

The government consultation also highlighted industry’s concern that the pumped hydro storage threshold needs to be increased to 200 megawatts. The Government rejected that on the grounds of a lack of evidence. Does the industry need to repeat the experience for the Government? Is the Minister convinced that there is no lack of vision in this respect, and that faster progress could not be achieved by raising both thresholds above the 50-megawatt level? What evidence would the Minister’s department need? Would consistency across the devolved Administrations always be considered the more important aspect? However, avoiding the considerable extra burden of the NSIP regime is of great importance to the technology.

During the passage of the Energy Act 2016, there was a lot of general debate on battery storage, underlining the clear necessity of its development to capture greater benefits from renewable and low-carbon technologies. The key element of support for the development of battery storage revolves around how to categorise it under the regulatory framework. The case was made for the creation of a separate licensing regime, either as a subset of generation or as a stand-alone regime.

The smart systems and flexibility plan, and its follow-up in 2018, set out the intention to make changes to both arrangements as well as to the threshold arrangements. Can the Minister give the Committee any information on when further progress will be made with the battery licensing part of that intention? I understand that the department has completed preparatory work to define storage in primary legislation. Will the energy White Paper, which is now long overdue, include these aspects within its appraisals of future plans? Will there be answers in time for COP 26? What indications can the Minister give on that today?

The importance of energy storage’s linkage to the grid through different microtechnologies and the inclusion of schemes to small businesses and households were highlighted by other speakers. We all await the necessary technology improvements to make further progress and will wait to hear how the Government may enhance this with complementary schemes for local communities.