Contracts for Difference (Allocation) (Amendment) Regulations 2016 — House of Lords, 2016-10-25
Topic: Energy
Lucy Neville-Rolfe (Conservative, Centre-right): I thank the noble Lord for his helpful remarks and for the welcome he has given the order this evening. As I said earlier, the regulations that the Government seek to amend through this instrument affect the contracts for difference scheme designed to incentivise the significant investment required in our electricity infrastructure to keep our energy supply secure and the costs affordable for consumers, and to help meet our climate change targets. The instrument being debated today enables us to continue to deliver on that by allowing future allocation rounds in order to deliver new renewable generation capacity into the 2020s and to give confidence to investors for the future, which the noble Lord rightly emphasised The noble Lord was kind enough to mention his concerns about the dates in the Explanatory Memorandum. In particular, he asked why there is an apparent gap—from 2020 to 2021—in paragraph 7.2. The levy control framework presently runs until 2021. He is right to note that there are different periods, and that is in fact intentional. The regulations relate to the legal power to open up delivery years. We have already ensured investor confidence by announcing at Budget 2016 £730 million of support for projects commissioning —that is, delivering—between 2021 and 2026. We have made a conscious decision not to have a CfD round for less-established technology projects that start to generate electricity before 31 March 2021 because of the potential overspend in the current LCF period, which runs until March 2021. We are of course committed to delivering our decarbonisation objectives but not at any cost. Therefore, we are not planning to offer more CfDs for deployment within the current LCF period Paragraph 10.2 of the Explanatory Memorandum covers the administrative costs of running the scheme, not the subsidy being provided to developers through CfD auctions Turning to the levy control framework, we are within the headroom permitted under the LCF and, as the noble Lord knows, we have already taken action to reduce spend by around £520 million up to 2020. The levy control framework covers the renewables obligation and the feed-in tariff, as well as CfDs. Our focus on supporting new renewables is through the contracts for difference scheme using competitive tendering, as I said in my introduction, to drive down prices and therefore the costs to consumers. The Treasury announcement focused on that CfD scheme, which is giving investors the confidence they need going forward. It did not mention clawback. We have not taken a decision on the future of the levy control framework beyond 2021. The National Audit Office has recommended the extension of that framework beyond 2020. In response to the noble Lord’s question, we are considering that and the NAO’s other recommendations, and we will respond in due course Finally, the noble Lord mentioned the requirement to report after five years. There is a duty to report after five years on a wide range of matters, including CfDs, and I will certainly make sure that I personally look at that in the light of the points that he has raised this evening This is a non-controversial and important proposal. The time is late and I commend the regulations to the House.