One of the barriers will be the shortage of grid and cable capacity to link into. Is the hon. Gentleman envisaging some kind of privileged access or some solution to the grid shortage?
That is not quite the subject of our debate, but the right hon. Member can see that we envisage an energetic and far-reaching proposal to develop the grid in such a way that those grid shortages are overcome, so that the grid is able to service the low carbon economy in the way we would all want it to do. In the context of what we are discussing, I remind the right hon. Member that this would be about distributed grids at a local level, rather than the national high-level grids. We need to take further action to strengthen and sort out grids at that level.
The Lords clearly continue to feel strongly about this issue; as we can see, they have sent back to us today a modified version of the original amendment, requiring the Government to consult on changes to assist community energy and, importantly, to set a timeline for proposals to be brought forward to remove barriers to the development of community energy.
Of course, there are others in this House who feel strongly about this issue. The proposals that the Lords have now twice tried to have inserted into the Bill are essentially the wording of a group called Power for the People, which suggested wording for a community energy enabling Bill for which it campaigned to secure signed-up support from parliamentarians. It did indeed secure substantial support from parliamentarians who feel strongly on the issue of community energy. Some 325 Members signed up in support, including 130 Conservative Members and, perhaps most remarkably, 22 members of the Government, including six Treasury Ministers, the present Chancellor and the Minister himself, as I often seek to remind him. There is no lack of support in the House for the principles and practice of community energy.
The Lords amendment seeks to acknowledge and further that support by putting forward very reasonable and, one might have thought, pretty non-contentious wording to add to the Bill. It is inexplicable to me that the Government should seek to resist these proposals in the way they have. Yes, they will say, as the Minister has said, that they have set up a community energy fund of ÂŁ10 million over two years, which is welcome, and they have verbally indicated that, at some stage, there will be a consultation on barriers to supply, but there are no timelines for that and no commitment to move positively forward from it. That is what this amendment seeks to put right.
As I have said, the Minister appears already to be a signed-up supporter of community energy action, and I would fear for his own emotional wellbeing if he were forced today to perform another policy backflip and acquiesce in yet another Government repudiation of themselves in rejecting this latest Lords amendment. Instead, let us end the extended passage of the Bill on a high note, and all around the House agree on both the importance of community energy and the measures we will need to take to ensure it thrives in the future.
October 21, 2023
Good morning.
I wonder how many MP’s and Lords and Ladies have worked in the energy business ? No many I would guess. Yet they presume to enable laws which will have a impact on all our lives.
I am not to well up on this ‘Community Energy’. If they are talking about Combined Heat and Power (CHP) then all I can say is, these units are only suitable for new dwellings and not for the majority of existing ones. It will solve little to nothing and will just further kick the can down the road.
October 21, 2023
WTF is community energy. Sounds like another expensive quango to shift the blame when we have power cuts.
Waffle, waffle waffle……
October 21, 2023
@Mark B; I wonder how many currently working, or investing, in the energy industry make small fortunes (bonuses, dividends etc) from the existing shambles, and thus the last thing they want is for the mess of their own making to be resolved?
The rights and wrongs of the 1980s privatization of the energy industry is for another debate, but decades on, both the electricity and natural gas grids are not fit for purpose any more, and that is simply down to the extraction of profits before investment.
The problem with our current, and that of the Blair era government, is they refuse to see the elephant in the room, despite it stamping on their feet each and every winter, no, no, the plebs must surely be using to much energy.
October 21, 2023
We have enjoyed the consultation in this diary over many months. Conclusion, your government have screwed up big time by praying at the altar of a false religion and forcing the population to make heavy contributions to the plate before being allowed out of the church. Then to find themselves more impoverished than the clergy, your government lest you have lost the plot.
October 21, 2023
Is this âCommunity Energyâ proposal the scheme that involves localised small (modular) nuclear reactors?
If it is, good! So letâs get on with it!
With regard to the By Election, the main message should be that the government should act like a CONSERVATIVE Government.
October 21, 2023
No. I posted links to sites relating to the subject highlighting so xalled charities push renewable ONLY.
But our kind host deleted the post.
October 21, 2023
Seems like waiting for a miracle or to find a way of avoiding the laws of physics. Not very productive.
October 21, 2023
By far the best solution is to abandon all this net zero nonsense and all the problems it makes. Net zero is in any case a policy of pure evil which will destroy the futures of every man, woman and child in Britain.
October 21, 2023
Dr Whitehead appears to think distributing what we can currently produce by adapting the community end of the Grid is sufficient. Does the good Dr. think the required future growth to cope with mass use of EVs can already be handled?
October 21, 2023
I like Dr. Whitehead’s words “…we envisage an energetic and far-reaching proposal to develop the grid…”. That is spirit! Oh to have been in the public gallery to call out “castles in the air”.
October 21, 2023
Is this all about putting up electricity pylons near all our homes? It seemed odd to me that a âshadowâ energy minister was trying to school and intimidate a government minister âhe fears for your emotional well-beingâ this is why I canât stand politics I really donât know how you bite your tongue with all the sarc.
Why was he concerned you wanted to repudiate the Lords amendment, what was in that amendment that you didnât like?
October 21, 2023
“Dr Whitehead (Shadow Minister for Climate and Net Zero):”
My, what a title to have.
What next… a Minister for Gravity? A Minister for Atomic Weights?
Just preposterous.
October 21, 2023
Well, Monty Python did give us the Ministry of Silly Walks.
October 22, 2023
Minister for Daydreaming.
October 22, 2023
An awful lot of weasel words but zero practical initiatives. Surely the only zero emission way forward for electrical energy at local level is with SMRâs? Why isnât this solution being actively considered? We already know wind is intermittent and thus unreliable and solar is daytime only on a sunny day. Neither can keep our grid stable and operational 24/7. We do not want more wind turbines blighting our countryside or indeed electricity pylons!
October 23, 2023
I took a look at the Power to People proposal. In essence it is an attempt to instate a replacement for the highly lucrative Feed in Tariff scheme that was closed to new applications in 2019 that bolsters the SEG scheme that initially replaced it.
https://www.ofgem.gov.uk/environmental-and-social-schemes/smart-export-guarantee-seg
Retailers have been unwilling to pay much for surpluses under the SEG, as they tend to arise when wholesale prices are low, potentially result in other generation having to curtail, and come with consequences in upgrading the local distribution grid to handle them when they face a cluster such as a new housing estate with a high number of solar installations. Costs are passed to consumers in general to subsidise the operation. The problems this causes are more visible in Australia, where regulator AEMO is now calling for centralised control of rooftop solar to curtail export surpluses – of itself a costly system since there is increased fire risk if solar panels are not able to dump energy as electricity as well as the control system. Problems include local overvoltages that can burn out appliances and distribution transformers.
The added administrative complexity of a greenwash scheme that pretends that customers are being supplied by their local renewables even during Dunkelflaute is another layer of cost for general bills, and does nothing to resolve the need for supply at those times.
What it does expose is the folly of government plans to aim for 70GW of solar that might produce 55-60GW on a sunny summer Sunday when demand is only 25GW. Now make it a windy summer Sunday… I calculate that the typical battery park stores about 5MWh per acre, so the 120TWh of storage called for by the Royal Society would require 24 million acres of battery parks. England is only 37.3 million acres.