Meeting of the Parliament 07 May 2014
No, I am not taking interventions because I am short of time. [Interruption.] Sorry—another occasion, Mr Harvie.
In acquiring the expertise to develop world-leading renewables technologies, Scotland has the opportunity not just to reduce its own carbon emissions but to help the rest of the world to reduce emissions, too. If we are going to help to save the planet, we have to do so on the basis of good science, good sense and a reasonable and rational approach. That is why I am glad that the Scottish Government has set up an expert scientific panel to advise it on unconventional gas while it takes steps to strengthen planning and environmental protection.
It is also why I am dismayed at the effects of UK Government energy market reform and disappointed at the UK Government’s delay in implementing the recommendations of the Office of the Gas and Electricity Markets’s project transmit, which offers at least a partial solution to the disproportionate transmission charging regime. It is why I am disappointed at its failure to invest in upgrading the grid, not least providing interconnectors to Scotland’s islands, which could generate 5 per cent of the UK’s electricity requirement by 2030.
There is another way of achieving the end that Alison Johnstone and I both wish to see: meeting our climate change targets by advancing our significant renewable energy opportunity. That has the advantage of improving our economic performance and not diminishing it, of creating jobs and not destroying them, and of reducing energy prices over time and not increasing them. Unfortunately, the UK Government has been hindering that objective and not helping to meet it, which is why Alison Johnstone and I agree that we will make much more progress on that issue and many others after independence.
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