The transition to a greener energy sector and a low-carbon economy are both essential if Britain is to meet its Net Zero targets without undermining the industries that generate wealth and economic growth. That means the government’s new industrial strategy needs to deliver on both counts.
A key section of the strategy is that relating to clean energy industries. The secretary of state for energy security and Net Zero, Ed Miliband, declared in the foreword to this document that: “The global transition to net zero calls for huge investment in wind, nuclear fission and fusion, hydrogen, carbon capture, heat pumps, networks and other critical technologies.”
Some may note that one technology is not specifically listed – that of biofuels. This will raise the question of how much importance will be given to the ‘other critical technologies’ more vaguely referred to by the minister.
Government Priorities
Mr Miliband added that the strategy will help create a lot of highly skilled jobs (which would certainly be the case if some of them involve fitting breather valves to a proliferation of new anaerobic digestors), as well as claiming the plans have the potential to make Britain a “world leading exporter of low carbon products, services and innovation”.
The secretary of state added that the Ukraine war has demonstrated the vulnerability of relying on fossil fuels, which, of course, may be taken in two ways. One of these would be to look at alternative sources of general energy, which could mean replacing gas appliances with electrical ones powered by greener sources, or, alternatively, using biogas.
What the document makes clear is that there is a hierarchy of technologies that the government sees as playing the leading role in making the UK a ‘clean energy superpower’, but bioenergy is not in the leading group.
Instead, the priority category includes wind, nuclear fission, nuclear fusion (even though this is not an established technology as yet, notwithstanding that the potential is vast), plus carbon capture and storage, greenhouse gas removal, hydrogen, and heat pumps.
What Does ‘Not A Frontier Industry’ Mean?
Bioenergy appears in a secondary list of what is described as “vital for the Clean Energy Superpower Mission, but are not among these frontier industries”.
That may sound a little negative, but the government has pledged further investment into this secondary list, and it is worth noting what the other components of it are: solar energy, energy storage, heat networks and smart technologies.
None of these are low-profile industries. Solar has been heavily pushed in the past through policies like the feed-in tariff, although of late, there has been a hot debate about whether solar farms on rural land are a better option than a focus on putting more photovoltaic panels on buildings.
This is not an option for bioenergy, of course, which will require premises of significant size. This can mean there are planning system challenges, but that is equally true of any other development, from windfarms to new nuclear power stations. Indeed, a bioenergy plant may be somewhat less visually intrusive.
Bioenergy Still Has A Big Role
Furthermore, while bioenergy may not make the headlines or get the priority focus of the industrial strategy, government departments have nonetheless recognised just how large a part it can play in a greener energy future.
In March, UK Research and Innovation announced more research into the potential of bioenergy, noting that “Bioenergy is a developing area considered to be a major potential contributor to a resilient, productive UK energy system,” and that as the UK moves away from fossil fuels, its use is “increasingly attractive”.
Of course, bioenergy is itself a broad area. Some of it includes biomass, which in simple terms can mean wood pellets to be burned to generate heat to drive electricity turbines. That is not the same as the production of biogas to act as an alternative to the natural gas extracted from the rock beneath the North Sea, or imported from overseas.
For that reason, the high proportion of energy generated from ‘bioenergy’ in the UK is not all about biogas. However, neither that, nor the fact that it isn’t listed in the “frontier industries,” means it isn’t of importance.
Instead, the industrial strategy may be understood in terms of the potential for further technological development in particular areas, with greater efficiency, the development of genuinely new technology and the potential for making great advances (especially in fusion) all offering the possibility of major boosts to British exports and new jobs.
It may be that bioenergy does not offer that to the same extent, but that does not mean it will not still have a significant role in the UK’s greener energy future.
