The hon. Member is absolutely right. We are in global competition for resources that are presently being procured for things across the world that we are still thinking about, worrying about and wondering whether to go ahead with, when we know that the availability of those resources is rapidly running out. If we do not take action very soon, we will simply find when we come to the table that all the food has been eaten.
The right hon. Member for Preseli Pembrokeshire highlighted the grid, which he rightly described as not fit for purpose. My personal view is that lack of action to undertake the necessary uprating and reorganisation of the grid will be the undoing of all our net zero
ambitions. We have heard that projects seeking to get their connections to the grid firmed up are facing delays of up to 10 years. If we do not urgently get the grid up to scratch so that it can capture and deliver low-carbon electricity, we may well completely miss our targets, because we will have a number of schemes in hand but will be unable to plug them into the grid to deliver any low-carbon power to anybody. Urgent action to get the grid up to scratch is important.
The grid needs to be able to deliver electricity around the country effectively. At the moment there is a tremendous problem with constraints between Scotland and the north of England and the south, where we are increasingly turning off low-carbon power to balance the system. Quite often, we are bringing gas into the system because we cannot move that power around the country properly. We need urgent grid bootstraps to make constraints a thing of the past, and the Government have only recently woken up to the idea that action should be taken. Frankly, they are way behind the curve on the work that needs to be done.
The hon. Member for North Devon (Selaine Saxby) made a telling contribution on the future of floating wind in the Celtic sea. We have to bear in mind that floating wind is part of the ScotWind process, too. I do not need to add anything to what she said about the danger of failing to reach our targets on floating offshore wind development and all that that means for RenewableUK’s ambition to have some 34 GW of floating offshore wind in UK waters by 2040. We are going to miss that initial target, so where will we be on our future targets unless we get our act together on supply chains, the grid and the development of offshore wind in general in the very near future?
My hon. Friends the Members for Kingston upon Hull West and Hessle (Emma Hardy) and for Stockton North (Alex Cunningham) raised the issue of carbon capture and storage, and the problems we are having with developing it for the future. They are absolutely right, among other things, to query the arrangements that are presently under way on cluster development. It baffles me, to be honest, that we continue to have competition between clusters on CCS and hydrogen development. We had a first-track competition before placing in reserve—whatever that means—the important Scottish cluster, which is essential for the future of CCS. We have second and even third rows of clusters waiting to see whether their ambitions can be realised. A number of companies involved in those ambitions have put their concerns on hold while the Government decide the track for each project. We should not have tracks; they should proceed together. We ought to be clear about that.
If the Department had a target for consultations and papers, it would have easily exceeded that target, but I am afraid they are not yet attaching themselves to the urgent progress needed on net zero. That is the main charge laid against the Department by Members on both sides of the House this afternoon.
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