Article in the House Magazine
23 February 2009
Pg 33 Estuary Expectancy
It's extraordinary that, in less than four years, climate change and the need for cleaner, greener energy has risen from being a favourite obsession of policy wonks to a mainstream political consensus. Now, hard on the heels of this new orthodoxy, we're forced to address the much harder practical problems of how we convert our energy sector from its current overwhelming dependence on fossil fuels to greener and more renewable sources.
Some of the groundwork has been done, of course. The Climate Change Act created legally binding targets to cut all six greenhouse gases of 80% by 2050. That’s a great start, but setting a target shouldn't be confused with achieving it. The National Audit Office says our current policies will only cut our reliance on fossil fuels by 10% over the next decade, so there's a huge gap between the target and reality.
The good news is that environmental virtue will bring other rewards. There are lots of sources of low-carbon energy in Britain and around its coast, so greener energy should make us less dependent on Russian gas or Middle Eastern oil. And if we can move quickly enough to become a leader in at least some of the emerging low-carbon industries we could strengthen British business hugely too.
But that's a lot of 'ifs' and 'buts'. At the moment we're following in other countries' footsteps in too many of the most promising technologies, rather than leading the pack. It's early days in many green industries, of course, so there's still enough time for Britain to develop some strong competitive positions, but we can't afford to hang about. We need to open up opportunities for British businesses in key renewable technologies. Part of the answer lies in updating our electricity networks to stimulate investment. A system of ‘feed-in-tariffs’ would pay anyone to generate their own green energy and feed it into the grid, which should encourage thousands of small scale renewable generators to start work. Decentralised energy generation is more efficient too, because less power gets lost in the transmission cables before it reaches consumers. So whether its biogas plants turning farm waste into electricity, solar panels on the roofs of offices and homes, wind farms either on or offshore, we need to get cracking.
Where does the Severn Barrage fit into this future? It could be part of the mix, but the jury’s still out on whether a barrage is the best way to harvest the power of the Severn. There are other, rival technologies which might generate cheaper energy and be better for the environment too. The Government is half way through a feasibility study to compare their competing claims and, until they've finished, the debate is stalled. They've cut the different projects down to a shortlist of five schemes; three barrages or varying sizes; and two 'tidal lagoons' which are basically tidal reservoirs enclosing the mudflats.
The stakes are sky high. The Severn estuary is Britain's single largest potential source of green, renewable energy. At the moment it's entirely untapped but, harnessed correctly, it could provide 5% of Britain's energy on its own. But while tidal power is completely predictable - you can calculate exactly how much power a barrage will produce on a Tuesday afternoon fifty years from now - it's also intermittent. So if high tide doesn't coincide with the evening's peak demand for electricity, a lot of power gets wasted. It causes problems for environmentalists too: how do you weigh up all that lovely green electricity against the probable damage to the Severn's internationally recognised, heavily protected and very fragile ecosystem? Local people have mixed feelings too. A big barrage could transform the economy of a seaside town like Weston-super-Mare, but what if it stops the tide from reaching the beach? The Government's feasibility study must answer all these questions and, when it does, the debate will only just have begun.
