Written by Phil Kent, CEO of Gravis
The Labour government’s commitment to making the UK a clean energy superpower was a positive re-enforcement of their policy promises and commitments to hire 300 more planners and work with the National Energy System Operator and Ofgem to accelerate grid connections are also welcome to unlocking development.
Gravis continues to believe that this presents a material opportunity for investment and growth in the UK and is needed to keep us on track with our decarbonisation commitments.
Infrastructure and clean energy pledges included £8bn for carbon capture, usage and storage infrastructure and includes 11 green hydrogen projects. There is also support for four new electrolytic hydrogen projects across Scotland and Wales, £200m for electric vehicle charging infrastructure, support for port infrastructure to facilitate floating offshore wind (£134m), and £125m for Great British Energy in 2025/26 with £100bn over 5 years.
However, while the list is encouraging, it feels somewhat unambitious given the scale of investment needed to deliver on binding obligations in the UK’s sixth carbon budget and the 2030 grid decarbonisation objective. For example, £125m for GB Energy is small when compared with the c. £65bn needed to deliver on the 140 GW of installed renewable capacity (up from c. 57 GW) committed to as part of Labour’s manifesto.
What is positive is that there does not appear to have been a winding back on Labour’s position of putting the UK energy transition second only to economic growth. Infrastructure and Net Zero form two of the seven ‘pillars’ identified to support the Growth Mission and are recognised as enablers of others.
There was, however, no material change in the pace and level of support that we consider is needed to achieve the stated ambitions. A 10-year infrastructure strategy will be published in the spring of 2025 and a ‘Clean Power 2030 Action Plan’ has also been committed to. Both are expected to contain more detail than has been provided today on how Labour’s commitment to decarbonise the electricity grid by 2030, and support wider infrastructure deployment, will be achieved. If this detail is not forthcoming, those ambitions are looking increasingly unlikely to be achievable.
