Renewable Energy (Hansard, 13 May 1991)

§ 10. Mr. Speller
To ask the Secretary of State for Energy how he proposes to assist renewable energy projects to fulfil the non-fossil fuel obligation.

§ Mr. Moynihan
My right hon. Friend proposes to assist renewable projects by requiring the regional electricity companies to contract for renewable generating capacity under a series of additional tranches of the non-fossil fuel obligation.

§ Mr. Speller
I thank my hon. Friend for his helpful remarks. Is he aware that the public at large, and young people in particular, have accepted and support the clean, renewable energies of wind, wave and tide? Will Her Majesty's Government consider how they can encourage the use of those resources, which are popular, cheap and infinitely renewable, by the grace of the good Lord?

§ Mr. Moynihan
My hon. Friend is absolutely right. The most important way in which we can help this year is to make a second order under the non-fossil fuel obligation for renewables, which we shall do. We shall take note of my hon. Friend's important point that we should support not just one or two potential renewable sources, but a whole series, and that we should identify separate tranches of the NFFO.

§ Mr. Simon Hughes
The Minister will be aware of the widespread support, as the hon. Member for Devon, North (Mr. Speller) said for increasing the proportion of our energy that is produced from renewable sources. However, one inhibition has been the apparent conflict between, for example, a barrage and the conservation interests of wildlife in an estuary, whether it is the Severn or the Usk, Felixstowe on the east coast or the Lyme. Will officials at the Department of Energy put their heads together with officials at the Department of the Environment to try to provide, as a matter of policy, a proper way of evaluating environmental and energy benefits and disbenefits so that we find the best sites for wind, tidal and other alternative sources, rather than having a battle each time a site is chosen? We should have a strategy, not an ad hoc approach.

§ Mr. Moynihan
The hon. Gentleman is right to identify a problem that we faced and, I believe, resolved. That problem highlights the additional need for planning policy guidance to be given by the Government to local authorities so that we avoid the sort of diversity described by the hon. Gentleman. Work is under way on a planning policy guidance note, which will be isssued shortly and will go a long way towards resolving the problem described by the hon. Gentleman.