Engineering news
The Secretary of State for Energy and Climate Change, Amber Rudd, has said it was 'difficult to say' if the UK is on track to meet its 2020 renewable energy target while giving evidence at a Parliamentary committee, prompting criticism from the renewable energy sector.
The committee was held following a leaked letter from Rudd that stated the UK is on track to reach just 11.5% of its 15% Renewable Energy target for 2020 – leaving the UK at risk of delivering only slightly better than half the contribution from renewables from the rest of Europe, set at 20%.
The secretary of state also confirmed that they were looking at making up the targets potentially from importing renewable power from overseas.
In response Rudd's comments, RenewableUK said: ““If the Government is worried about meeting its renewable energy targets, wind can help make up the shortfall. It makes sense to reduce our dependence on imports and to tackle climate change using our superb home-grown resources”.
Leonie Greene, head of external affairs at the Solar Trade Association (STA), echoed RenewableUK's sentiments, and said it was “clearly absurd to be decimating the most cost effective renewable power technologies while exploring the potential to make up the UK renewable target shortfall by importing renewable electricity from overseas.”
Green added: “The solar industry has already seen the government prioritise public support towards more expensive overseas utilities over British solar. It is very difficult to understand the lack of interest in supporting British companies. The Secretary of State herself said she would rather meet the target at home so why is she decimating our industry and looking for electricity from overseas?"
The STA said it was extremely keen to see action on renewable heat, a sector highlighted by the Rudd, stating that the UK is exceptionally poor on renewable heat and it has almost the lowest contribution in Europe.
Leonie Greene said: “We are all for urgent action on renewable heat, but a sensible approach to renewable power does not, as Rudd suggests, mean ‘abandoning’ heat. There is plenty of scope to strongly ramp up renewable heat while providing a sensible framework to safeguard public investment in the British solar industry. It is not either/or. We are not on track to meet the 2020 targets, investor confidence has been severely damaged by recent policy chaos, the world is half way to dangerous climate change – the UK does not have a minute to waste to get its solar industry back on track.”
The STA recently released a £1 rescue plan for solar power that would deliver 2.7GW of solar power by 2020. While this amounts to just 0.17% of total energy in 2020, leaving huge scope for advancing the heat and transport sub-targets, STA said the £1 plan would work to safeguard the solar power sector. “Logic would dictate that if the UK is falling short in renewable heat, which now looks inevitable, it should make every effort to improve performance but also make up the shortfall in electricity, given the difficulties of making progress on transport,” said the STA. “This is especially true if electric vehicles are going to be a contributor to the transport target as the Secretary of State suggested.”