UK Net Zero Emissions Target

Lord Soley Excerpts

Wednesday 12th June 2019 Lords Chamber

[Lord Henley]

My noble friend makes the point that it is important that we take people with us. As he says, people are not going to wear hair-shirts or give up their holidays. I agree with him that gas will continue to play a major part in this. That is why one occasionally looks rather hopefully over to the Liberal Democrats and others to seek their support for such things as shale gas extraction. He is also right to refer to the importance of carbon capture and storage. We will continue to research matters in that area. We should also look at further research into the storage of electricity and other forms of energy; again, this came up only recently.

[Lord Soley (Lab)]

Would the Minister accept that research bodies and universities have to play a central role here? This is to do with not just the climate change gases that we produce but the rapid melt of the permafrost in the northern hemisphere. We are seeing some effects of this even in north Scotland, with some fires burning out of control, which did not happen previously. Controlling the use of climate-changing gases is important, but the ability to extract them from the atmosphere is particularly important.

[Lord Henley]

The noble Lord points out how important it is that we continue all the research we do. A great deal of research is going on into the areas he talked about. I could also take him through research I have seen into wave power, tidal energy and a whole range of other areas. We will continue to support that. Innovation is at the heart of what we seek. It potentially has great benefits for this country, as well as in reducing our carbon dioxide production.

Brexit: Galileo Space Project

Lord Soley Excerpts

Thursday 26th April 2018 Lords Chamber

[Lord Henley]

My Lords, if not anything else, it suggests the folly of the Commission in making this suggestion. Other countries have not said that they would not like us to participate. That is why my right honourable friend is engaging with other countries. There are benefits to the UK and to the whole EU with us continuing to participate. I repeat that if we do not participate—we are one of the lead players in this—the extra costs of this programme would be €1 billion and it would delay what is a good programme by up to three years.

[Lord Soley (Lab)]

Following on from that question and answer, is the Minister aware that the digital security factor involved in this is crucial? The French are already making major efforts across the board to take work from British satellite and aerospace companies because we have a lead in such manufacturing. We will lose that lead to particularly France and Europe generally unless we can sign up to some digital security deal. That is vital and the Government need to say so, otherwise we will lose out massively.

[Lord Henley]

My Lords, the noble Lord makes a perfectly good point. My right honourable friend has made these points in his letter to the other Ministers involved in this country. That is why the other Ministers— certainly in my department, and in others—have already started engaging on this and will continue to do so. This is a proposal from the Commission but we want to see what the other countries feel about it as well.