Question to the Scotland Office:

To ask the Secretary of State for Scotland, what is the specific purpose is of the Government's £14.5 million funding for Granngemouth; whether this funding is expected to be allocated to technologies identified in the Project Willow scope; and whether this funding will align with (a) existing Grangemouth investment workstreams and (b) Scottish Government funding.

The UK and Scottish Governments are working together to progress all investment at Grangemouth. To support this, on 11 December we announced the first project to benefit from this £14.5m funding, the Scottish biotech company MiAlgae, which will receive a total of £3 million from both governments to develop an innovative new project on the Grangemouth site, using byproducts from whisky distillation. This investment is expected to support around 310 jobs over the next five years.

This is the first of a number of projects we are working to bring to the site, though at this moment in time, we cannot provide further information on future allocations of funding due to commercial sensitivities. On 17 December we went further, committing £120 million in support for the ethylene plant at Grangemouth. The UK Government remains firmly committed to delivering a successful low-carbon future for Grangemouth.