Utility Week

12 | 10TH - 16TH MAY 2019 | UTILITY WEEK Policy & Regulation CCC, given that much of the cost of carrying out the work is the civil engineering rather than the kit itself. It is "important" therefore that this addi- tional investment is factored in by Ofgem in the upcoming 2023-28 RIIO2 network price control framework. The transmission network will also need to keep pace with the roll out of giant new offshore wind farms envisaged by the CCC. It's a big menu, which given the more stretching nature of a net zero target, the UK no longer has the luxury of tackling step by step, says UKERC's Watson: "This really means moving on all fronts at once." In turn, greenhouse gas reduction must become a priority across government rather than just within BEIS, he adds: "This really requires decision making across government at all levels, not just BEIS and Treasury." That would include emissions reduc- tion being factored into the Green Book, which the Treasury uses to appraise invest- ment projects and priorities, Watson adds: "It has to be at that level so that every time government is considering a policy or an investment, it has to be seen in the light of compliance with net zero." And given the steeper nature of the chal- lenge, the government must also be more willing to embrace regulation rather than relying on the market to deliver change. Pointing to the successful roll out of lower emissions gas condensing boilers, he says: "Where it has been tried, regulation has brought about rapid change in circumstances where alternative technology is ready." Customers And one of the differences between the cur- rent and next phase of the UK's decarbonisa- tion journey is that consumers will have to continued from previous page Cross-party view This is war Politicians say the government should put an end to what they call 'climate appeasement'. P rogressive think-tank the Institute for Public Policy Research (IPPR) has launched an Environmental Justice Commission to set out a plan for a rapid transition to a green economy. One of its co-chairs, Ed Miliband MP, called for a "revolution in political leadership" on climate change. The commission's members include leading figures from business, trade unions, civil society, academia, and climate activists including a young climate striker and member of Extinction Rebellion. Its remit is to set out an ambitious and rigorous programme of reform capable of tackling the dual problems of climate change and wider economic and social injustice. It will seek to employ a "delib- erative democracy" approach to its work to get the views of people all around the country on the way forward for change. At the launch of the group, Miliband urged that the government be put on a "war footing" to tackle what he called the "biggest threat to our economic and social wellbeing, and national security". He was joined by fellow chair Caroline Lucas MP, who warned that "maintaining the status quo is to gamble with the fate of humanity". She said that "the environ- mental crisis can only be tackled through a transformation of our whole economy". Laura Sandys, the third co-chair and former Conservative MP, cautioned that recent disruption by activists would be nothing compared to what we will see "if we don't take transformative action to address the climate emergency now". be involved a lot more, for example when their heating system has to be replaced. Stark says: "The things we've done so far in the UK, particularly decarbonising the power sector, have been made without con- sumers having to engage. "If we are to get to the next stage of net zero the consumer will have to be engaged." And that will require a greater level of public debate about emissions reduction than has taken place so far. Simon Clark, MP for Middlesbrough, expresses confidence that there is strong cross-party support for net zero. At the pre-CCC report briefing, the Con- servative backbencher said the government should capitalise on one of the rare areas where cross-party consensus exists to push through the legislation that will be needed to make it binding. He said: "There is a lot of will to make this happen. There's a lot of dead time at the moment in parliament and real frustra- tion among MPs that we are here for long hours but a lot of the time we are not that occupied. "If we can harness energy and enthu- siasm in parliament, it would be some- thing very worthwhile to achieve at a time when reputation of UK politics is not at its highest. "If you look at what we could conceiv- ably introduce in the next parliament, I can't think of anything that trumps this in terms of seriousness or goes more to the heart of what we are about as a nation." The CCC has thrown down the gauntlet to the government by declaring that net zero can be achieved, says former Conserv- ative cabinet minister Lord Deben: "You can do it and if we don't, it's because you have chosen not to do it." Key role envisaged for hydrogen Mass deployment of hydrogen as a fuel will be key to the UK achieving its 2050 net zero emis- sions ambition, according to the CCC report. Gas distribution networks will either have to be decommissioned or, if feasible, repurposed to hydrogen by the middle of this century, according to the CCC. The report sees a role for hydrogen in areas where the electric grid may reach "limits of feasibility and cost-effectiveness", such as providing heat for industrial and buildings on colder winter days. But unlike in the field of renewable power, this ambition enters territory that has not yet been proven as a large-scale commercial proposition. The UK must find out quickly how signifi- cant a role hydrogen can play in decarbonising the heating system, says UKERC's Watson: "We need large-scale trials involving thousands of homes to get evidence to see if it's a goer and to decide what regulations would be appropri- ate for that option." Efforts to boost hydrogen must go hand in hand with a viable CCS (carbon capture and storage) industry, says the CCC. The first CCS clusters in areas, like those containing large amounts of heavy industry, must be operating by the mid-2020s. All of these regional clusters must have CO2 infrastructure by around 2030, by which point hydrogen production should have started at scale. And it will not be possible to eliminate the hardest-to-reduce emissions, like those from aviation, says the CCC. There will have to be mechanisms in place to offset these emis- sions, like direct air capture of CO2 and more controversially plants that combine biomass burning and CCS. The UK could require 75-175 megatonnes of CO2 to be stored annually by 2050, the committee estimates. Conference call "Investing in net zero carbon UK" is one of the key themes that will be explored at Utility Week's Energy Summit "Delivering a robust future for UK energy in a post-Brexit landscape", in London on 13 June. Download details at https://event.utilityweek.co.uk/ summit/

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