How did we get here? Coutinho's DESNEZ debut.
With (a lack of) offshore wind floating in the background, it would always be tough for the new cabinet minister.
It was finally time for Claire Coutinho to face her first DESNEZ questions as Secretary of State earlier today. With (a lack of) offshore wind floating in the background, it would always be tough for the new cabinet minister.
Conservative MPs Selaine Saxby and Peter Aldous kicked off the session by asking the SoS what assessment she has made of the potential of contracts for difference allocation round 5 on floating offshore wind's future development.
Responding, Coutinho said that her department’s contracts for difference scheme is a “UK success story, having contracted more than 30 GW of capacity, including 20 GW of offshore wind, since 2014.”
But when you look at the government’s climate targets, we need to reconsider Coutinho’s response. The UK’s aim to reach 50GW of offshore wind power by 2030 in the UK faces significant challenges as the recent CfD auction left us 5GW behind. In the words of Michael Savage of the Guardian, “Industry figures said there was now a 24GW gap “between what we think we can procure in auctions for offshore v 50GW target for offshore”.
So - the Secretary of State didn’t quite get off to a cracking start. This wasn’t helped by Ed Milliband raising how the auction failure would add £2 billion to bills.
Methane flaring was next on the bill. This comes after a Liberal Democrat amendment to the Energy Bill proposed to ban the practice, which, if included, would clear up 72% of the UK’s methane emissions. The amendment was pushed to a vote but was defeated by the government.
Caroline Lucas pointed this out to energy minister Graham Stuart, but, having not been there, the minister seemed to believe that the house had not debated the amendment.
The session soon turned to the recent Climate Change Committee report. Liz Twist noted the key finding of the report: of 50 key indicators of Government progress on tackling climate change, just nine were on track.
This report is very long, so if you want me to post a summary then feel free to request it.
The defacto ban on onshore wind has become a hot topic during department questions, and many (really cool people) will have been at the edge of their seats waiting to hear Coutinho’s stance on the subject this morning.
Sadly, Graham Stuart took this bundle of questions and didn’t give us much more than we already knew. Praise for his department’s progress (should have gone to Specsavers) was short-lived, however, as he lept into a defence for British oil and gas.
Well there you have it, the big hitters at least. You can find links for the Hansard records for the other questions below.