Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:

To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, pursuant to the Answer of 26 June 2020 to Question 60659 on Renewable energy, what plans her Department has to install solar panels and wind turbines on its buildings in the next five years.

DWP is in the process of drafting and internally socialising its Carbon & Utilities Management Plan, covering 2020 to 2025 to meet the Greening Government Commitments targets and the UK Net Zero Carbon emissions trajectory. DWP’s approach is to reduce emissions utilising the Energy Management Hierarchy. With this in mind, and when the plan is agreed, we will commit to investigate opportunities to reduce site energy and building baseloads and where economics are favourable whilst using our Crown Commercial Services frameworks we will consider but not limit ourselves to the following renewable & low or zero carbon schemes:

1. District Heat Networks (DHNs)

We will commit to explore and work with UK city wide DHN developments to decarbonise the heat demand within our buildings.

2. Water/ground/air source heat pumps

We will commit to carry out Low or Zero Carbon studies where we instruct new builds and major refurbishments.

3. Photovoltaic and thermal installations

We will commit to exploring utilising our car parks and building rooftops for solar PV and solar thermal systems.

4. Wind generators

We will commit to reviewing our sites to assess the practicality of using wind turbine technology.