Question to the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy:

To ask the Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, what steps his Department is taking to enable onshore wind and solar developers to compete for low cost power contracts in areas where communities accept such developments.

Onshore wind and solar PV are potential sources of low cost renewable energy capacity. Government policy has already brought forward nearly 13GW of large scale onshore wind and 13GW of solar PV.

We do not believe that new large scale onshore wind power is right for England, but it could be right for other areas, where local public support exists. We are currently considering ways in which further onshore wind and solar PV capacity could be accessed.

The Government has secured state aid approval to classify remote island wind as a separate technology in Pot 2 of the CFD scheme. The Clean Growth Strategy announced that we would provide up to £557m in total of annual funding for future CFD allocation rounds. We have consulted on how the Government could support the development of onshore wind projects on remote islands, where they benefit local communities, and are currently considering the responses we have received.