Asked by: Baroness Jones of Moulsecoomb (Green Party - Life peer)
Question to the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy:
To ask Her Majesty’s Government whether they will support the proposal by the EU Committee of the Regions to establish locally determined contributions and regionally determined contributions to the greenhouse gas emissions targets set by the Paris Agreement on climate change.
Answered by Lord Prior of Brampton
Under the Paris Agreement countries agreed to work to limit global temperature rises, it is then up to countries to plan how they will meet this. The EU and its Member State contribution to the Paris Agreement is a -40% reduction in domestic greenhouse gas emissions by 2030 compared to 1990 levels. Individual Member State targets to deliver this overall commitment are currently being negotiated.
UK greenhouse gas emission targets under the EU framework and our domestic Climate Change Act cover the whole of the UK. Devolved Administrations and Local Authorities also already have their own emissions targets and ambitions, and with wider actors in the UK, have an important role to play in contributing to UK emissions reductions.
Asked by: Baroness Jones of Moulsecoomb (Green Party - Life peer)
Question to the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy:
To ask Her Majesty’s Government, further to the Written Answer by Baroness Neville-Rolfe on 4 January (HL4265), how many previously unpaid awards are included in the sum of £83,000 secured under the Employment Tribunal Penalty regime to date.
Answered by Lord Prior of Brampton
The updated amount of unpaid awards secured under the Employment Tribunal Penalty regime is now just under £99,500. This equates to 29 previously unpaid awards.
Asked by: Baroness Jones of Moulsecoomb (Green Party - Life peer)
Question to the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy:
To ask Her Majesty’s Government how the contribution of cities and local government will be examined in the forthcoming emissions reduction plan.
Answered by Lord Prior of Brampton
The Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy is looking ahead to the emissions reduction plan, which will set out how we will decarbonise across the UK through the 2020s.
The benefits of local energy projects include increased economic growth, carbon reduction, improved public health and welfare, and cost reduction. Support for local energy aligns with and complements other work across Government, including devolution and the provision of flexibility and decision making powers to local areas.
Officials are already actively engaging with Local Enterprise Partnerships, Local Authorities, the community energy sector and other local partners to support delivery of local energy projects which contribute to the achievement of national objectives.
Asked by: Baroness Jones of Moulsecoomb (Green Party - Life peer)
Question to the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy:
To ask Her Majesty’s Government what are the latest forecasts for the capacity and generation of electricity by solar photovoltaics for each year up to 2025.
Answered by Lord Prior of Brampton
The latest renewables capacity forecasts are published in Energy and Emissions Projections 2015; however, these are not split by technology.
It is challenging to make such forecasts due to the large number of installations involved, the speed of installation and the continuing fall in costs; these factors mean that long-term forecasts are unlikely to be either accurate or helpful.
Asked by: Baroness Jones of Moulsecoomb (Green Party - Life peer)
Question to the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy:
To ask Her Majesty’s Government what progress has been made in implementing their Memorandum of Understanding with the Local Government Association on energy and climate change issues.
Answered by Lord Prior of Brampton
There is an existing Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) between the Department for Energy and Climate Change and the Local Government Association (LGA) which previous Ministers agreed in 2013. Following the machinery of Government change last year, officials in Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy are continuing to meet with the LGA to identify ways to enhance this and move the MOU forward for the whole of the new department.
Asked by: Baroness Jones of Moulsecoomb (Green Party - Life peer)
Question to the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy:
To ask Her Majesty’s Government what assessment they have made of the impacts on the growth of community energy projects of changes to the Feed-in Tariff scheme and the removal of tax relief for such projects.
Answered by Baroness Neville-Rolfe - Minister of State (Cabinet Office)
The Department provides quarterly updates on the number of and capacity of installations within the Feed-in Tariff scheme registered as community groups and schools. These are available at the following link: https://www.gov.uk/government/statistics/community-and-school-feed-in-tariff-statistics
It should be noted that these statistics may be incomplete because it is not a requirement for a community group or school to identify itself, unless it applies for a specific benefit available to community groups or schools.
The subsidised generation of renewable energy by community organisations ceased to be a qualifying activity for the Government’s tax-advantaged venture capital schemes from November 30 2015. The Government published a Tax Information and Impact Note, which can be found at: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/income-tax-exclusion-of-energy-generation-from-venture-capital-schemes/income-tax-exclusion-of-energy-generation-from-venture-capital-schemes.
The Government has made no further assessment of the impact of this measure on the growth of community energy projects.
Asked by: Baroness Jones of Moulsecoomb (Green Party - Life peer)
Question to the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy:
To ask Her Majesty’s Government how many community energy photovoltaic (PV) installations have been installed each year since 2012; what capacity has been produced by those installations in each of those years; and how much community energy solar PV installations are projected to produce in 2017.
Answered by Baroness Neville-Rolfe - Minister of State (Cabinet Office)
The Department provides quarterly updates on the number of and capacity of installations within the Feed-in Tariff scheme registered as communities and schools. These reports are available at the following link: https://www.gov.uk/government/statistics/community-and-school-feed-in-tariff-statistics
It should be noted that these statistics may be incomplete because it is not a requirement for a community group or school to identify itself, unless it applies for a specific benefit available to community groups or schools registered as such. We do not hold information on community solar PV installations developed outside of the Feed-in Tariff scheme.
Asked by: Baroness Jones of Moulsecoomb (Green Party - Life peer)
Question to the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy:
To ask Her Majesty’s Government whether they intend to reintroduce pre-registration of Feed-in Tariffs for communities and schools.
Answered by Baroness Neville-Rolfe - Minister of State (Cabinet Office)
In our 2015 review of the Feed-in Tariff scheme, we determined that reintroducing the tariff guarantee element of pre-registration was not compatible with the wider cost control measures introduced. However, we continue to keep the situation under review.
Asked by: Baroness Jones of Moulsecoomb (Green Party - Life peer)
Question to the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy:
To ask Her Majesty’s Government how many meetings of the Community Energy Contact Group there have been this year; and whether the minutes of those meetings have been published online.
Answered by Baroness Neville-Rolfe - Minister of State (Cabinet Office)
The Community Energy Contact Group met with officials from the Department of Energy and Climate Change in May and July 2016.
The record of the meetings will shortly be published online at:
https://www.gov.uk/government/groups/community-energy-contact-group
Asked by: Baroness Jones of Moulsecoomb (Green Party - Life peer)
Question to the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy:
To ask Her Majesty’s Government whether they intend to publish a further update to their Community Energy Strategy; and if so, when.
Answered by Baroness Neville-Rolfe - Minister of State (Cabinet Office)
The Department of Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy is engaging with stakeholders to explore next steps for community and local energy in the context of the forthcoming Emissions Reduction Plan.
The Government has no current plans to publish further updates to the Community Energy Strategy, originally published by the Department of Energy and Climate Change in 2014.