Hydrogen Transport

Rachel Maclean Excerpts

Thursday 26th November 2020 Commons Chamber

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Transport (Rachel Maclean)]

I heartily congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Rother Valley (Alexander Stafford) on securing this excellent Adjournment debate. I cannot believe it is the first debate we have had in the House of Commons solely on this topic, but I am sure it will not be the last.

--- Later in debate ---

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Dame Eleanor Laing)]

Order. I just make the point that there has clearly been a misunderstanding here. The hon. Lady thought she was going to make a speech. Everyone else thought she was intervening. I have allowed her to make a speech. Let me make it absolutely clear for the record that I am not setting a precedent. There has been a misunderstanding, so let us just smooth it over.

[Rachel Maclean]

Thank you very much, Madam Deputy Speaker. I am grateful for your guidance on the matter.

I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Rother Valley very much indeed; he made an absolutely excellent speech highlighting his vast range of expertise on this important topic, which is based on his prior experience and on his role in the all-party parliamentary group on hydrogen.

As is clear from the points raised not only by my hon. Friend but by my hon. Friend the Member for Ynys Môn (Virginia Crosbie) and the hon. Member for Aberdeen South (Stephen Flynn), this technology provides a vast and exciting opportunity for our nation. Our world-leading researchers, innovators, engineers and vehicle manufacturers are already putting the UK at the forefront of this new era in transport technology, but we want to keep aiming higher, pushing further and, in particular, harnessing the potential to build back better.

Last week, the Prime Minister set out the 10-point plan for a green industrial revolution, which I am proud to say contained several key transport policies, including £20 million to support the development of cost-effective zero-emission HGVs in the UK; £20 million to help develop clean maritime technology as part of the clean maritime demonstration programme, which will take place at key sites, including Orkney and Teesside; further investment in research and development on the infrastructure upgrades required at UK airports to move to battery and hydrogen aircraft; and £3 million for the recently announced Tees Valley hydrogen transport hub, to which my hon. Friend the Member for Rother Valley referred.

In the Department for Transport, we intend to build on those announcements through our forthcoming and ambitious transport decarbonisation plan, which will set out how we intend to reduce emissions and deliver transport’s contribution to net zero by 2050. There is little doubt that the compelling case for green hydrogen set out by my hon. Friend the Member for Rother Valley has been heard by the Prime Minister and the Department for Transport. It will play a key part in meeting that goal and in helping to decarbonise the wider economy. We are committed to exploring what that role might be.

We are already investing up to £121 million in hydrogen innovation, supporting a range of projects in heating, transport and the production of low carbon hydrogen, with carbon capture utilisation and storage, and electrolysis technologies. Furthermore, our £23 million hydrogen for transport programme is increasing the uptake of fuel-cell electric vehicles and growing the number of publicly accessible hydrogen refuelling stations.

We are already seeing the possibilities of hydrogen being demonstrated right now, often with the help of Government funding. In the maritime sector, for example, a range of exciting projects is taking place: a company in Lowestoft called Windcat Workboats is leading work to develop hydrogen-fuelled zero-emission vessels; and in the Orkney Islands, Government-supported trials are exploring the use of renewably sourced hydrogen to fuel ferries.

Birmingham’s first hydrogen train, the HydroFLEX, has been built by the University of Birmingham and rail company Porterbrook with the support of a £750,000 grant from the Government. In the skies, US start-up ZeroAvia is using a £2.7 million Government investment to develop a hydrogen-fuelled powertrain that is being demonstrated on a small aircraft.

Since 2015, we have also funded £7.4 million through the low emission bus and the ultra low emission bus schemes to provide 62 hydrogen buses and infrastructure. The Prime Minister confirmed our commitment to deliver 4,000 zero-emission buses in his 10-point plan, backed up with £120 million to kick off this programme in 2021. I note that the hon. Member for Aberdeen South has made a clear request for those buses to be in Scotland. No doubt that has been heard. In Northern Ireland, bus company Translink bought a fleet of double-deckers built by Wrightbus which are powered by hydrogen generated from local onshore wind energy.

My hon. Friend the Member for Rother Valley rightly poses many challenges. Hydrogen provides us with enormous opportunities, but it also presents us with equally important questions: how do we manufacture it in a sustainable and cost-effective way? How do we enable hydrogen-powered transport technology to scale up and get cheaper? How can we make hydrogen a real and viable option for transport operators? To help answer those and other questions, we are developing a transport hydrogen hub in Tees Valley—the first of many perhaps, as my hon. Friend will be glad to hear. It will support and develop cross-modal applications of hydrogen in transport.

[Alexander Stafford]

Will one of those hubs be in Rother Valley?

[Rachel Maclean]

My hon. Friend will not be surprised to hear that I was expecting that question. I have noted very carefully his desire for Rother Valley to be a hydrogen valley. I will consider his request carefully.

Across Government, we are looking to accelerate the use of hydrogen in transport and its development. We have commissioned a master plan—we are cracking on with this work—which will outline options for hydrogen supply and storage infrastructure and support innovation facilities ahead of going through business case and planning processes in 2021, with a view to tendering industry for the infrastructure build in 2022. I will be happy to meet my hon. Friend to discuss the case that he is making in more detail in future.

In closing, I thank my hon. Friends the Members for Rother Valley and for Ynys Môn very much for their continued interest in the role that hydrogen can play to support decarbonisation. I will of course consider carefully the policy asks laid out by my hon. Friend the Member for Rother Valley. We have committed to publishing a comprehensive UK hydrogen strategy in early 2021, which will bring together the UK hydrogen story, showcasing activity to date and setting out an action plan for decarbonisation and expansion in the 2020s. Let me assure everyone that hydrogen has a future in transport and in levelling up Rother Valley and the whole of the United Kingdom.

Question put and agreed to.