Biofuels — Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs

Part of the debate – in the House of Commons at 5:06 pm on 11 March 2004.

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Photo of James Paice James Paice Shadow Secretary of State (Home Office) 5:06, 11 March 2004

Unsurprisingly, I will join the general consensus about the need to support biofuels, but I want to address the issue from a slightly different angle, by pointing to a fundamental inconsistency in the way in which the Government have dealt with the correct obligations that they undertook at Kyoto.

My main thesis is my concern about climate change and the need for this country to do all that it can to help to minimise its impact, so I want to consider biofuels as part of the whole energy scenario, rather than concentrate on the narrow issue of road transport. We risk getting it wrong by narrowing our focus to road transport. I want to consider biofuels straightforwardly against the fundamental objective of reducing the impact of climate change. Of course we cannot ignore other issues, such as the security and reliability of supply, the environmental impacts of whatever steps we take and the economics—the cost of saving carbon dioxide and the impact on the rest of the economy of whatever decisions we take—but I start from a fundamental belief that biofuels have a significant role to play.

The energy White Paper shows that the Government are planning a massive expansion of wind power for electrical generation, yet on 17 September in evidence to the EFRA Committee, the Economic Secretary said that the likely cost per tonne of carbon saved through offshore wind generation is the same as for biofuels. I ask the Minister to take back to the Government a question: why is there such a rush for wind power, yet such reticence about biofuels? Wind power is highly inefficient and unreliable—no one can guarantee that the wind will always blow in any location—and it has high maintenance costs. Most importantly, it has an atrocious environmental impact.

The environmental footprint of wind power must be considered. I am glad that Mr. Wright is here because his constituency contains one of the earliest fleets of windmills, which I have seen on several occasions, and they have a significant impact on the environment. I defy all those hon. Members who represent constituencies where planning applications for wind farms are in the pipeline—there are many of them—not to say that there is huge local resistance to them. They are all opposed.

There is also the issue of substitution. The Government are running down nuclear power and replacing it with wind power, but they are not actually reducing carbon dioxide emissions at all. Whatever one's views about nuclear power, it does not generate carbon dioxide. I happen to be pro-nuclear but, even if one is not, one cannot pretend that running it down has an impact on the global environment. The rush to wind power is singularly unwise.

Hon. Members have rightly referred to bioethanol and biodiesel and about the levels that can be put into existing engines. The figure is between 5 per cent. and perhaps 15 per cent. for bioethanol, but I understand that there is no upper limit for the maximum inclusion rate of biodiesel. We have discussed the duty derogation and, although I know that I am probably renowned as a bit of cynic, it really is a piece of green trickery by the Government.

By introducing a 20p derogation, the Chancellor is able to claim green credentials in the full knowledge that that would not cost him anything. The derogation is not enough to trigger a realistic industry. As Paddy Tipping neatly said, all we have got is a bit of chip oil. We have not got a serious industry, and we will not have one with the derogation that we have at the moment.

The Economic Secretary, in his evidence, seemed to be very worried about sucking in imports and subsidising industries elsewhere. We have discussed agriculture and there has been a substantial increase in food imports, but the self-same Minister said that security of supply was not an important factor. I think he is wrong, but that is what he said. Therefore, worrying about whether the supply is from imports or domestic production would not seem that important. I passionately care about domestic production and, given the right incentives, I am convinced that we could have one.