Utility Week

UTILITY WEEK | DECEMBER 2022 | 35 Talking Points… Why are we delaying our low-carbon future? E arlier this year, then prime minister Liz Truss made a welcome, if surprising, commitment to li the ban on onshore wind in England. Onshore wind is one of the quickest ways to bolster the UK's renewable capacity, at a lower cost than its o• shore alternative. Li ing the ban on onshore wind could reduce energy bills by a total of £16.3 billion. Recent studies have also shown that support for onshore wind is high, with polling by Opinium showing that 74% of British people support building more wind farms, including 72% of Conserva- tive voters. The beneŠ ts of onshore wind are recognised by supportive local com- munities who wish to host new onshore wind in their backyard and help create up to 27,000 skilled jobs, boosting the economy by £45 billion a year. This year has also seen wind power set new generation records, with wind farms generating more than 50% of total energy demand on certain days in October. Queue the inevitable disappointment that the new government has reversed one of the few positives from Liz Truss' brief time in No 10. While the current prime minister continues to evade questions around onshore wind, the Labour leadership has picked up on the public sentiment and has pledged to double the capacity of onshore wind farms. We hope the current government will consider going beyond consulting on community support for onshore wind. Even as the government clariŠ ed that the ban on onshore isn't going anywhere, the position on solar farms remains unclear. The former government was rumoured to be considering ban- ning farmers from building solar farms on their land without any substantial evidence of its impact on food produc- tion. The reality is that solar only covers about 0.1% of UK's land. Compare these to quarries, which take up three times that amount. Even expanding solar to achieve net zero targets is expected to result in just 0.3% of land being used. This is the time to remember that solar is now nine times cheaper than gas and could supply up to 17% of the UK's annual energy needs by 2035. Solar's popularity with farmers and the public has made it hard to under- stand why the government might be targeting solar farms. With the rising cost of electricity, we have seen recent examples of community initiatives of taking over solar farms – with the most recent in Shropshire powering nearly 1,000 homes. With 55% of land being used for farming and pasture, restrict- ing solar from being built in these areas could set us back from achieving our net zero and domestic energy security targets and jeopardising the UK's position as a world leader. The UK desperately needs a stable policy environment to ensure investment in low-carbon energy. Delays to policy documents such as the energy National Policy Statements, which are essential to building critical infrastructure, are adding to delays already being caused by constraints to obtain connections to electricity grid networks. The UK's planning system needs to re™ ect the UK's increased international and domestic ambitions in climate mitigation and energy security to develop generation capacity. The British public already under- stands that renewables are the future – we just need the government to listen and deliver. Aradhna Tandon, policy manager, Energy UK Comment: The public supports onshore wind and solar farms, so the government's hostility is both costly and perverse. Quote, unquote The news in numbers: 1GW Combined capacity of three giant battery storage facilities being constructed across Scotland by Zenobe. £426m Sums approved by Ofgem for claims by Suppliers of Last Resort relating to 2021 spate of retailer failures. 50 Megalitres will be transferred from the West Midlands to A• nity and Thames Water's regions under a new £250‚million project. 20GW Record amount of power generated by wind in a half- hour period, recorded on 2 November. "It is really important that we don't rip up the system and start again. A huge amount of investment is required this decade and changing the rules quite dramatically could endanger it." Dr David Jo e, head of net zero at the Climate Change Committee, on energy market reform

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