Clause 94 - Consents for generating stations offshore
Energy Bill [Lords]
8:55 am
Mr Bob Blizzard (Waveney, Labour)
I am saying that we have to take a balanced approach to this. There is a legitimate shipping and navigational interest, but we have to balance that against other important matters such as the need to develop renewable energy through wind farms offshore. Our debate on the clauses and the amendment is not about balance, but about introducing an unreasonable veto. If the debate was about balance, the amendment would not be necessary because wind farm legislation already has to comply with the United Nations convention on the law of the sea.
As part of the process for establishing those wind farms, each development must already have an environmental impact assessment—a rigorous and
demanding procedure that must give weight to navigational interests and set them in the context of other interests. The proposals we are debating would privilege shipping above all other interests, and those hon. Members who tabled them did so not purely for shipping, as they have a deeper motive. Shipping is being used as a convenient tool to undermine offshore wind development.
Honesty is needed in answering the question, ''Are we all committed to renewables?'' Everyone says that they are, but I was amazed to read in Hansard reports of debates in the other place involving outright hostility to offshore wind farms, which was also evident on Second Reading. The argument is that offshore wind is unreliable and expensive and that the Government are ignoring other renewable energy sources, but wind is a renewable source that is reasonably technologically advanced—enough to allow commercial development. Other technologies are not yet in that position, although I expect tidal current to be there in about five years. If we are committed to renewable energy and to meeting the target we need to set for it, it must be wind—now.
Let us bring further honesty to the debate. My hon. Friend the Member for Morley and Rothwell (Mr. Challen), the hon. Member for Hazel Grove (Mr. Stunell) and other members of the renewable and sustainable energy group visited Germany to examine wind development. We went to the German Energy Agency and learned that the Germans are about to move into offshore wind development in a big way. We heard about none of these problems from the Germans, but they asked us why we are going offshore when we have so much capacity onshore, as it is harder to develop wind power offshore than onshore. The honest answer is that it is difficult to make progress with onshore wind, whether we call that nimbyism or something else. Onshore wind development has become bogged down in the planning process and is often rejected.
Offshore wind development probably is more expensive, but by going offshore we thought that some of the opposition met by onshore development might be escaped. The heart of the opposition to onshore is that people do not like the idea of windmills being sited too near their property because they think that will devalue it. That is not unreasonable, but it makes wind farm development very difficult.
The proposals are a new way to try to block wind farm development. Shipping is a legitimate interest, but why is it being elevated and exaggerated in this debate?