Meeting of the Parliament 25 February 2015
I have only four minutes and I have a lot that I need to get through.
We should also accept that—contrary to Murdo Fraser’s statements—transmission charging impacts on the renewables industry. Scottish Renewables states in its briefing to members:
“Levying higher charges on generators using the transmission network located furthest away from the main centre of demands can present a barrier to renewable energy generators which must locate where the resource is strongest, often far from the main centres of demand.”
Renewable energy, in terms of its location, is not as flexible as other forms of energy generation might be, because of the requirements of the resource from which the electricity is delivered into the grid.
On Murdo Fraser’s call for a new gas power station on the site of Longannet, it is worth noting that without resolution of the transmission charging regime situation, any future station of the type that Murdo Fraser envisages will, irrespective of the merits or otherwise of the proposal, simply find itself being affected by the same transmission charging problems and the same economic barriers that Longannet is facing. The key is to address the discriminatory transmission charging regime, which results in—as the minister highlighted—projects in the south of England being subsidised for connection and projects in Scotland paying through the nose to connect.
I am becoming a little bit concerned that the Scottish Conservatives are becoming overly obsessed with wind energy to the point of its being detrimental to them. I note that they do not mind wind farms as long as they are, perhaps, beneficiaries as a consequence of the income. However, it is a little bit perverse that while the Tories seem to object to people being able to see turbines from their windows, they seem at the same time to be pretty gung-ho about having the same property drilled under as part of fracking and hydraulic exploration. The position that the minister has taken of imposing a moratorium in order that we can address the clear questions that need to be answered is sensible. I certainly do not wish him to go down the gung-ho route that Murdo Fraser and his colleagues seem to wish to go down.