Where else should it go?

Tweet Last week's announcement by National Grid of the preferred location for the substation to serve wind farms in Wales brings a long-running dispute to the surface once again.  But like many Welsh political arguments, it is an argument which seems to generate more heat than light.

Many of those I saw interviewed by the BBC were refreshingly honest - they concentrated on issues such as the view from their homes and villages and the effect on property values as the basis of their opposition.  These are issues to which most of us can relate; but ultimately, electricity generation, and the infrastructure to support that, have to go somewhere, and local concerns have always to be balanced with wider needs.

We need electricity, and we need to generate it somehow.  We cannot all assume that the electricity we want and need will be generated ‘somewhere else’.  If we are going to build wind farms in Wales then the infrastructure to connect them to the grid has to go somewhere.  Not building substations is simply not an option.

That in turn brings us right back to two underlying questions.

The first is whether and to what extent onshore wind has a role in the energy mix, and the second is the subsequent question of where it should be sited. 

The second of those is the easier of the two to answer - the best location is always going to be the one where the presence and speed of wind is most consistent.  And whether we might choose it to be thus or not, Welsh uplands are ideal from that perspective.

The first question is rather harder.  It is an issue on which opinion is seriously divided, and raises a number of issues.

Some opponents of on-shore wind don't accept the need to reduce emissions, and reject the idea that anthropogenic climate change is a real phenomenon.  This is, at least, an honest position to adopt.  It may fly in the face of majority scientific opinion, but majority scientific opinion hasn't always been proved right.  If emissions are not a problem, we can simply go on using gas, oil, and even coal.

However, the consequences of rejecting the majority view if it's right are much worse than the consequences of accepting the majority view if it’s wrong.  That balancing of risks and consequences would be enough to convince me that we should act, even if I wasn't convinced that the scientific majority was right.  And once we decide to act to reduce emissions, the fact that, as of today, on-shore wind is the most proven and readily available source of renewable energy is an inescapable fact.

"The benefits will flow elsewhere", we are told.  It’s true of course.  But it's also true of many other things that happen in Wales, whether relating to energy generation or not.  It's an argument (and one I’d entirely accept) for changing the economic model under which we exploit a resource, but it's not an argument for non-exploitation as such.  I want Wales to have control over its own infrastructure, and to be able to make a decent profit from those things of which we can produce a surplus.  But I also want there to be some infrastructure and surpluses for us to bring under our own control.

“It's exploiting Welsh resources for the benefit of England."  Again, possibly true, but over-simplistic.  Exploitation doesn't recognise, or stop at, borders.  If turbines were built on some of the more suitable locations in England (whether as well as, or instead of, is irrelevant in this context), that exploitative (if it is indeed such) relationship between users of electricity and those living close to the points at which it is generated would still be the same; it would merely have become internalised within a different set of human-defined borders.  (In any event, is either the wind or the landscape really 'owned' by those who happen to live nearby, or is it more widely 'owned' by us all?)

"They wouldn't be built without the subsidies."  Again, it's true that the subsidy regime encourages renewable rather than fossil fuel electricity generation.  That's exactly what it is intended to do, in order to reduce emissions from energy generation.  But it's also true that other forms of generation are effectively "subsidised" by being able to externalise some of their costs.  Not all subsidies appear in our electricity bills, but that doesn’t mean that they don’t exist.

But perhaps the favourite counter argument is the one about "wind farms are useless".  It is an issue which I have posted on before a number of times.  If it were true, then it would indeed be something of a killer argument against both turbines and the supporting infrastructure.

It is, though, a claim which is often based on selective use of facts, some interesting ‘interpretations’ of facts, and sometimes even simplistic axiomatic assertion.  Whilst a sensible policy wouldn’t go above around 15% - 20% wind in the overall generation mix, the argument that it is completely useless doesn’t stand up to examination.

The argument about whether the sub-station should go on the proposed location will no doubt continue – but it has to go somewhere, and the best form of opposition would be to come up with a more acceptable location rather than simply oppose its construction.

Racing for the bottom

Tweet The Welsh government frequently refers to the extent to which sustainability is seen as being its central principle in everything it does.  The idea is sound and it's a nice sound bite as well.  The problem arises in living the implications of making such a commitment.

Last week for instance, Tata steel, the operators of the Port Talbot plant, raised an issue over the price which they have to pay for energy.  Their European chief executive described high energy prices as an “obstacle" to growth.  Specifically he also complained that his company pays more for energy than competitors in France and pays business rate double those of competitors in Germany.  I have no reason to doubt either of those figures, but it's notable that his company would also be paying considerably less corporation tax on any profits in the UK than it would in either France or Germany.

Keen to support a major employer in South Wales Carwyn Jones, our first Minister, leapt to their support.  He called for what he referred to as a "level playing field" when it comes to energy prices, and urged the UK government to take steps to ensure such a level field.

What exactly he had in mind is unclear, but it seems reasonable to assume that what he was in fact calling for was government action to reduce energy prices.  That is, however, looking at only one factor.  And looking at one factor in particular is not giving proper consideration to the overall economic environment in which companies operate.

There is a question also over the extent to which Jones's call conflicts with his own government’s “central organising principle".  Indeed, he recognised the conflict when he said "Sustainability is important, but one of the main planks must be economic sustainability and sometimes they have to be trade-offs."

That sounds to me as though he is in fact saying that the commitment to sustainability applies only in so far as it does not conflict with the interests of major employers.  And such a commitment is no commitment at all.

There are indeed differences in energy prices between different countries.  And there are differences in tax regimes as well.  There is a danger in trying to be the lowest in order to compete in the interests of economic growth.  And that danger is that economic sustainability leads to environmental unsustainability.

I’m sure that Jones recognises that danger himself.  Indeed, some months ago, he argued that corporation tax should not be devolved to Wales because it would lead to a ‘race to the bottom’ as different parts of the UK sought to compete with each other for economic investment on the basis of a lower tax regime.  Up to a point, I agree with him.  That's part of the reason why I would argue for devolution of a range of taxes rather than considering a single tax in isolation.

Reducing energy prices to large consumers of energy to compete with other countries is another form of a race to the bottom.  But this isn't just an economic race to the bottom; it is also potentially an environmental race to the bottom, given the impact of energy consumption on emissions.

Now steel is going to be made somewhere.  It's an essential product to any developed or developing economy.  And we certainly would not want to create an economic environment which drives such industry elsewhere.  Solving our own emissions problems by moving them elsewhere is no solution at all. 

Creating an environment where companies are both successful economically and have incentives to reduce their environmental impact is a difficult balancing act.  But simply responding to their pressure for reduced energy costs is avoiding any attempt to do any balancing at all.

Energy Quotas

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I posted a while ago on the idea of personal carbon quotas.  As far as I’m aware, only one party in the UK (The Green Party) formally supports the concept as policy.  The idea is, though, slowly gaining ground, and if we wanted to have a ‘big idea’ underpinning the future development of Wales, it wouldn’t be a bad place to start.  It would certainly be a great deal more ‘transformational’ than many of the ideas being sold as such at present, most of which seem to be more managerial than transformational.

A week or so ago, an All-Party group of MPs produced a report recommending a move to TEQs (Tradable Energy Quotas), which is a slightly narrower version of the same idea.  (The full report is available here.)  It suggests that the idea is gaining some traction, although ‘all-party’ groups are not the same thing as formal committees of the House.  (And in this case, as the membership shows, support from the main governing party is a little thin, to say the least.)

It’s encouraging, nevertheless, that such a radical idea is being supported by MPs from more than one party.  One of the attractions to me (apart from the impact on carbon emissions) is that it is potentially a highly redistributive policy.  By allocating the same allowance to all, reducing that allowance over a period as we move towards a sustainable level, and allowing a market in the quotas, the inevitable result would be that those whose lifestyle is more carbon-costly than others (let us call them the rich, although that is a slight oversimplification) would have to buy additional quotas.

That would, in itself, represent a transfer of money from the most well-off to the least well-off.  The report argues that it is in the interest of all to keep quota prices low, and that that should be the outcome of such a scheme.  I’d tend to agree with the first, but admit to a degree of scepticism about the second.  It will be true if, and only to the extent that, the introduction of such a scheme rapidly encourages a change in behaviour in relation to energy usage.

If it does not have that effect in its early stages, then (especially given reductions in the total quotas) the quota price is likely to rise (which will actually reinforce the overall redistributive effect).  Eventually, the effect would be to force behavioural change as the most carbon-intensive lifestyles became prohibitively expensive – a properly-run scheme would allow no escape from the overall national energy (or carbon) budget.

Could Wales – should Wales – attempt to go it alone on this? 

On the first part, I’ll admit that I don’t know for certain whether the Assembly will have all the necessary powers, even after a yes vote; but I very much doubt it.  It could, though, be a significant and coherent focus for a future transfer of powers, if the Welsh Government were to support the concept.

As to the second, my first reaction was that it might prove difficult for any nation to ‘go it alone’ on a scheme like this, but the MPs’ report actually talks about the advantages of being first in the field.  I suspect that ‘early adopter’ is a better description that ‘going it alone’ in reality – if the world is serious about tackling man’s impact on the composition of the atmosphere, we’re all going to need to adopt this, or something like it, at some point.

Will it be popular?  I doubt it – and that’s probably why only the Green Party have formally adopted it as policy to date.  That does, though, bring me back to one of my favourite themes – should parties and politicians be in the business of telling people what they want to hear in order to win votes, or should they be in the business of telling people what they believe to be right, with a view to changing public opinion?

On environmental policy (as on constitutional policy), I’ve always taken the view that it is the job of any party which is serious about securing real and fundamental change to lead, not follow, public opinion.  Putting radical objectives to one side in pursuit of votes means that politics becomes little more than a beauty contest to decide which bunch of politicians should be in government.  And on the question of emissions control, merely reflecting and trying to implement existing public opinion will mean that action will be too little and too late. 

The future is simply too important for that.

Cars, trains, and buses

Tweet Saturday's Western Mail managed to fill almost the whole of a double-page spread with a story about AMs telling the rest of us to use public transport whilst very few of them do the same thing.

It's based on an analysis of travelling expenses claimed by AMs, and assumes that if they haven't claimed it, then they can't have spent it. Given the current attention being given to those MPs who go out of their way to claim every last penny to which they believe that they are entitled, this is a natural assumption to make; but that doesn't mean it's correct. It may well be that AMs who take only short distances are actually making more use of public transport than at first sight appears, and just not bothering to claim it back.

However, the first thing that struck me is that the reasons stated for not using public transport are, in fact, remarkably similar to those of the rest of the population; in this context, at least, AMs are nothing special. Convenience, journey time, reliability, timetable problems particularly outside peak hours – all of these things contribute to the decision to use, or not to use - public transport.

Interestingly none of them mentioned cost; but for many people, that's one of the key issues in making the decision, even if it's not the one that they own up to. There is often a real financial advantage for the individual to drive rather than take the train, even if driving is more expensive.

Take an employee – of any organisation - who is travelling on business from Carmarthen to Cardiff, for instance. Train fare, £15.10; petrol cost 150 miles @ say 10 miles to the litre = c £15. Case 1, claim £15.10 on expenses; case 2 claim 150 miles @ 40p per mile = £60 on expenses. It doesn't take a genius to work out why many employees will choose to drive, citing the lower journey time as the justification.

We all know what we should be doing if we're serious about emissions from transport; and most of us fail a lot of the time. But if those urging us to make changes to the way we travel aren't doing so themselves, it surely serves only to underline the fact that 'urging' will never be enough by itself.

I think that the logic of that is pretty clear - but what to do about it? There are some changes that can be made which are pretty non-controversial. Alleviating bottlenecks on the rail system where there are only single-track stretches is an obvious one. Providing extra capacity, in terms of longer trains or more frequent trains is another.

Other changes are much harder to gain consensus around. Increasing the cost differential between public and private transport would help. It's likely to be popular if it's achieved by reducing the cost of public transport (until people see the effect on taxes at any rate!); but increasing the cost of private transport doesn't sound like an immediate vote-winner to me. There's always 'compulsion' or 'prohibition'; but I'm sure that Sir Humphrey would rapidly tell any minister minded to follow that route that it would be a very 'brave' decision.

Ultimately, however, if we are really serious about getting to grips with the issue of the contribution made by transport to carbon emissions, what are the alternatives? Politicians urging people to do one thing whilst themselves doing the other is clearly the wrong sort of leadership – but are people ready for the right sort?