David Lepper

Labour Party | Brighton Pavilion

Sunny Day Event

Renewable Energy and Energy Efficiency

Statement for the Brighton Sunny Day event

The Level Brighton

4th July 2004

As the local Member of Parliament and as a members of the House of Commons Environment, Food and Rural Affairs Select Committee I welcome this event supported by Brighton and Hove City Council and Friends of the Earth to highlight -

• Renewable energy
• The dangers of climate change
• And the importance of energy efficiency

It comes just two months after the Labour Government’s  Energy Bill began going through the House of Commons on 10th May.

That Bill is a vital part of the strategy to combat climate change – and to deal with fuel poverty.

Issues which are of course important on the global scale and on the local.

Particularly in a city like Brighton and Hove  where energy inefficiency in the home and fuel poverty go hand in hand because of the large number of old Georgian and Victorian buildings, particularly in the city centre areas.

The Bill aims to set the right legal framework to help us reach our target of 10% of UK energy being supplied by renewable sources by 2010 and seize the real business and environmental opportunities that renewable sources present.

It follows the publication of Energy Efficiency – The Government’s Plan for Action published in April 2003.

That plan sets out how the government aims to cut carbon emissions by more than 12 million tonnes by 2010 through energy efficiency.

This is considerably more than the 10 million tonnes identified in the Energy White Paper a year earlier.
The Energy Efficiency Strategy Plan includes new measures such as

• a new aim to save 4.2m tonnes of carbon from households by 2010;
• doubling the level of Energy  Efficiency Commitment activity from 2005 to 2011;
• commitment to leadership by government and more emphasis on communicating about climate change.

There’s a Commitment to leadership by government, for central government to give priority to procuring only top quartile energy performance buildings.

This will send a strong signal to the commercial property market.

We have recently announced new energy targets for the central Government estate which will mean cutting our carbon emissions by some 29% between 1990 and 2011, going even further than our domestic goal.

Revision to Part L of the Building Regulations in 2005 will further raise the standards of new and refurbished buildings.

The Energy Performance of Buildings Directive, with its requirement for energy certification and labelling of buildings, will be an opportunity to unlock market demand for higher energy performance.
 
We will

• continue to inform, advise and support individuals, businesses and the public sector through the activities of the Carbon Trust and the Energy Saving Trust.
• give more emphasis on communicating about climate change.
• support new energy services pilots, through which energy suppliers will be able to offer innovative new energy efficiency packages to their customers.
• bring in new measures announced in the 2004 Budget including a tax allowance to encourage domestic landlords to invest in the properties.

Renewable energy must play an important part in reaching this targets

Every developed country is turning to renewable energy technology to address the pressing issues of climate change. It’s essential for combating clime change and offers good business opportunities.

The Energy Bill will help us to seize this opportunity in the UK, where we are starting from a low base.

In 2002, only 1.7% of the UK’s electricity was generated from renewable sources.

To hit the target of 10% of UK energy supplied by renewable sources by 2010, around 10 gigawatts of renewables generation capacity need to be installed.

The Bill creates the right legal framework to support future renewable energy developments further offshore, beyond territorial waters.

It paves the way for developments that could harness wave and tidal power as well as wind. It also makes provision for new transmission networks to connect groups of developments to the shore.

It also allows us to move to a UK–wide system of tradable certificates for renewables electricity once certificates can be issued in Northern Ireland and once Northern Ireland has implemented a corresponding system of mutual recognition.

It is therefore an important step forward in fulfilling the Government’s commitment to a sustainable energy policy. In particular, it addresses three major challenges facing our nation:

• the challenge of climate change;
• the shift from being a net exporter, to becoming a net importer of energy; and
• the need to modernise our energy infrastructure to cope with changing technologies and needs.

Are we likely to meet renewables target?

Targets are challenging but remain on course and doing all we can to achieve them.

Since publishing the Energy White Paper in the  Spring of 2003  the Labour Government has

• Granted consents for 1.6 gigawatts of renewable energy – enough to power a city the size of Greater Manchester – with a further 2 gigawatts in the pipeline;
• Lifted over 750,000 vulnerable households out of fuel poverty through the Warm Front programme.

I’ve mentioned the support for Warm Front

Let me end by just giving some practical examples of what that means in my Brighton Pavilion constituency in the last year

£213,638 from the Warm front scheme has helped make 341 households in Brighton Pavilion more energy efficient and that’s good for household budgets, for the health of the people living in those homes and for the fight against climate change.