“…families and businesses continue to pay the price for Britain’s energy insecurity. Bills remain hundreds of pounds higher than before the energy crisis began and are expected to rise again soon. At the same time, we are confronted by the climate crisis all around us, not a future threat but a present reality, and there is an unmet demand for good jobs and economic opportunities all across Britain”
Ed Miliband, Secretary of State for Energy Security and Net Zero, Great British Energy founding statement, 25 July 2024) https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/introducing-great-british-energy/great-british-energy-founding-statement.
“Backed by a capitalisation of £8.3 billion of new money over this Parliament, Great British Energy will work closely with industry, local authorities, communities and other public sector organisations to help accelerate Britain’s pathway to energy independence”…” Great British Energy will create thousands of good jobs, with good wages, across the country. We will seize the opportunities of the clean energy transition and ensure the British people capture those benefits”
The new UK government’s recent announcement about renewable energy will please many people, especially the business community who will benefit from government subsidies and easing of regulation, urban dwellers who will be able to continue their energy-extravagant lifestyles at the expense of Britain’s rural heritage, and the jingoists who believe that Britain really is “Great”. However, it is based on a deeply flawed understanding of the causes of climate change and the need to reduce carbon emissions,[i] as well as a flawed approach to valuing the rural environment.
In addressing these issues, I must first acknowledge my own rural “peasant” biases. My early research in the 1970s and 1980s was about the evolution of the medieval rural landscape in England, and at the same I was also undertaking research on the contemporary lives of people living in rural areas in some of the poorest parts of Asia and Europe. I was honoured to serve as the elected Secretary General of the Permanent European Conference for the Study of the Rural Landscape for a decade between 1990 and 2000. These interests have never left me, and over the last 50 years I have come to have a deep love for, interest in, and understanding of the importance of rural landscapes as one of the richest parts of Britain’s heritage. I also know a world where the only heating in my house was from a back boiler, which also had to be on if I wanted any hot water. In winter, I vividly recall the water in the glass by my bed freezing at night. We wore layers of warm clothing in winter, and enjoyed the heat of summer, long before central heating and air conditioning[ii] became widespread.[iii]
This critique focuses primarily on three of the main issues that arise from the government’s recent announcements: lower cost electricity generation; renewable impact (both production and distribution); and the business model that serves the interests of the few rich rather than the many poor.
Energy supply and demand: why lower cost energy will increase the environmental impact
The idea that lowering energy costs through the use of renewable energy will be good for the people and good for the environment is deeply problematic. It appears to be grounded in the mis-placed belief that carbon emissions and their impact on climate change are perhaps the biggest challenge facing humanity, and that in our country we can address this through a heavily subsidised energy system that will enable us to be energy independent at a lower cost than we are paying at the moment. As Ed Miliband wrote on 25 July 2024, “That is why making Britain a clean energy superpower by 2030 is one of the Prime Minister’s 5 missions with the biggest investment in home-grown clean energy in British history.”[iv]
The problem is that lowering energy costs is almost certain to increase energy consumption in the long term, and it is energy consumption that is the real problem, not the blend of energy that we choose to supply. It is often argued that energy is an inelastic good, and that demand and supply are not responsive to price.[v] In part, this is because there are no close substitutes for “energy” as a whole, although differential costs for alternative fuel types mean that choices of specific fuels (including renewables) will indeed change depending on price.
There are, though, at least two problems with such an argument. First, one of the largest drivers of energy demand, and thus carbon emissions globally, is actually demographic growth (see my An environmentally harmful alliance of growth mantras).[vi] Historically, population growth in the UK has also been one of the main factors increasing energy demand, although the restructuring of our economy since the 1970s “from energy intensive industries, such as cement and steel, to services-based industries such as finance and consulting” has actually led to a substantial decrease in overall energy consumption.[vii] This decline in industrial consumption has masked domestic patterns of consumption. Moreover, recent evidence suggests that the impact of increased pricing mainly as a result of the Russian invasion of Ukraine has also actually had an impact on reducing existing demand (along with warmer weather) to levels not seen since the 1950s.[viii] This brings into question just how inelastic energy pricing really is. It seems highly likely that reducing prices as a result of the proposed government investment in renewables will actually lead to a resurgence in domestic consumption, which is something that will have negative impacts on the environment. Second, though, demand is also heavily influenced by what societies deem to be appropriate lifestyle choices. Being profligate with energy has been a core characteristic of British lifestyles for at least half a century when energy has been relatively cheap. We don’t actually need to heat and cool our homes and offices as much as we do. If price pressures encouraged us to reduce our domestic energy consumption, then this could only be a good thing nationally for the environment – although energy providing companies would undoubtedly bemoan the reduction because they flourish on increasing markets.
It would be much more sustainable to focus more on implementing effective strategies to reduce overall energy demand instead of increasing lower cost provision of renewable energy, especially when its environmental harms are fully appreciated. To be sure, there will remain those for whom energy costs will still be too high (so-called “fuel poverty”), but it is relatively easy to resolve this through appropriate financial subsidies or tax benefits for the financially poorest in our society, rather than funding businesses to produce more cheap renewable energy.
The environmental impact of the production and distribution of renewable energy.
One core element of the new government’s plan is to change the planning procedures to make it easier for renewable energy projects, notably wind farms and solar panels to be constructed on the land of the British Isles.[ix] As Mullane (2024) has commented, “Under the old policy any local community opposition could block the development of onshore wind farms, but this is no longer the case. The revised policy places onshore wind on the same footing as other energy developments under the National Planning Policy Framework (NPPF). This means onshore wind applications will now be processed in the same way as other renewable energy projects.”[x] Moreover, if large windfarms are indeed designated as nationally significant infrastructure projects this would mean that the Secretary of State, Ed Miliband, would sign off on them, and local councils and citizens would not have a say in the decision.[xi] For such decisions to be made, though, the Secretary of State would need to prove that the benefits of an onshore windfarm or similar energy project were greater than the costs, and among these costs has to be the environmental impact that they have. Our present systems of judging such impact, though, are woebegone, and fail to take satisfactory recognition of the real cost of destroying the historic landscapes that lie at the heart of our culture.[xii] The required environmental impact analyses are indeed quite detailed, but they fail sufficiently to address fundamental questions about the nature of the landscape, especially when windfarm turbines can be seen from a very long distance away. Traditionally, many such processes have been based on some kind of “willingness to pay” approach, where costs are estimated based on how much people would be willing to pay extra not to have something, such as a windfarm, in their neighbourhood. Unfortunately, people living in such areas are often poor, and the amounts they are willing to pay are readily overwhelmed by the financial and political alliances of companies and governments.[xiii] The basic problem, though, is that we don’t have a robust system for judging the impact of these initiatives, and it would seem to be essential that we do put an acceptable process in place before mega-onshore-windfarms are created that will change the landscape forever. Will, for example, detailed archaeological surveys be required before these schemes are put in place?
It is not only the environmental impact of windfarms and solar panels that requires attention but also the infrastructure necessary to transmit the electricity to where it is used. There is a robust ongoing debate about the impact of pylons, with campaigners arguing that they should not be built, and cables instead put underground at a cost that would in most instances not make such projects feasible.[xiv] Ultimately, the decisions that will be made will be political ones, and it seems likely at present that the new government will override such objections, claiming that they are nothing more than nimbyism.[xv] The use of new designs of pylons in the shape of a T might go some way to reduce the eyesore of these infrastructure projects,[xvi] but other more radical solutions also need to be found. One option, for example, would be to build entire new communities around such installations, so that there would be no need for pylons to transport electricity to current centres of high demand. Thinking more radically, it would make sense for heavy industrial uses of electricity to be relocated to parts of the world where few people live and there are excellent sun or wind resources that could be tapped to power them.[xvii] British companies could invest in industrial production in the Sahara for example, although this would not necessarily resolve the geo-political desire for self-sufficiency in energy.
A related challenge is that the areas of highest absolute demand for energy in the UK are often not where there is greatest potential for renewable production, especially for wind, hydro, and tidal. Over the last 35 years, transport (c.38% in 2022) has consumed the largest share of energy, followed by domestic (c.27% in 2022), industry (c.18% in 2022) and services (c. 17% in 2022).[xviii] These activities tend to be concentrated in and around urban areas, and accessing energy from places where it tends to be produced often therefore becomes yet another example of the “urban” exploiting and extracting a surplus from the “rural”.[xix] To be sure, wealthier people with larger houses tend to consume more energy per household, and often live in rural or suburban areas, but such impressions are misleading when interpreting total energy consumption across all sectors. Maps of energy consumption per unit of area in different parts of the UK are difficult to find, since most data are disaggregated on a per household basis. This in itself further disadvantages low population density, rural areas, because it gives the impression that they also have high total consumption levels, which is usually not the case.[xx] The voices of the relative few rural people who live in areas which are likely to be dominated by renewable energy production for the urban masses and the rich, need to be heard as representatives of the heritage landscapes that cannot speak for themselves.
The business interests behind renewable energy
An important part of the government’s case for expanding renewable energy production is that it will contribute to UK economic growth, employment, and expertise that will enable British companies to have a competitive advantage abroad – so that Britain can be truly great again. That is why Miliband makes the jingoistic claims that ““making Britain a clean energy superpower by 2030 is one of the Prime Minister’s 5 missions with the biggest investment in home-grown clean energy in British history”.[xxi] That is why the Labour Party talks and writes about how they will “Make Britain a clean energy superpower”.[xxii]
This development will only happen if the government spends billions of pounds of taxpayer’s hard-earned money on subsidising companies to develop these technologies and build the infrastructure to provide electricity where it is wanted. The price of renewable energy without government subsidy would be unaffordable by most people, and few companies would invest in the renewable sector without such subsidies and guarantees. The government has announced that it will spend £8.3 billion new money over the life of this parliament in capitalising Great British Energy, a publicly owned company, to “work closely with industry, local authorities, communities and other public sector organisations to help accelerate Britain’s pathway to energy independence”.[xxiii] Interestingly, it does not mention citizens or comrades in this list of those it will work with, let alone “for”. Companies have sold the government a dream that renewable energy will save the world from climate change and make Britain great again. This is primarily in their interests, not ultimately in the interests of the majority of British citizens. Moreover, the very real environmental harms caused by such massive roll-out of these technologies are either ignored or vastly under-estimated.
The growing power of the renewable energy sector is well-illustrated by their reaction to the new government’s apparently ambitious new subsidies. As The Guardian has recently reports: “Labour’s clean energy targets may already be in jeopardy just weeks after the party came to power with the promise to quadruple Britain’s offshore wind power, according to senior industry executives…The offshore wind industry has said there will not be enough time to develop the projects needed to create a net zero electricity system by the end of the decade unless ministers increase the ambition and funding of the government’s upcoming “make or break” subsidy auctions”.[xxiv] Ironically, many environmentalists, coming from a very different position to that of most companies, have also criticised the government for not going far enough. As the co-leader of the Green Party, Adrian Ramsey, has said “We need real change if we are to meet the demands of the climate crisis. These Labour plans do not deliver it…Compared to Labour’s original commitment to spend £28bn a year on green investment, this announcement of just £8.3bn over the course of the parliament looks tiny and is nowhere near enough to deliver Labour’s promise of ‘clean electricity’”.[xxv]
There is much to be applauded about the government’s aspirations, but some of the propaganda such as that noted below from the Labour Party seems to be over-ambitious – it is certainly surprising to see the claim that this will make us secure from “foreign dictators”.
Britain needs Great British Energy
https://great-british-energy.org.uk/
A new publicly owned, clean power company for Britain.
Britain already has public ownership of energy – just by foreign governments. Taxpayers abroad profit more from our energy than we do. It is time to take back control of our energy.
A first step of a Labour government will be to set up a new publicly owned champion, Great British Energy, to give us real energy security from foreign dictators.
Great British Energy will be owned by the British people, built by the British people and benefit the British people. It will be headquartered in Scotland, invest in clean energy across our country, and make the UK a world leader in floating offshore wind, nuclear power, and hydrogen.
In conclusion
The British people need to recognise that there will be a very significant impact on our precious rural landscapes from these new government policies. The scale of this is largely unacknowledged and unappreciated. Human impact on nature – our physical environment – has reached crisis point, and this is an issue very much bigger than merely climate change and the reduction of carbon emissions. The new government policies, although possibly being well-intentioned, will not solve the crisis for the British people, but are in danger of making it worse.
This article has merely touched on three of the main issues surrounding the new government’s renewable energy policy, and in conclusion offers three suggestions for practical ways forward:
- First, we should focus much more on reducing demand for energy, rather than on supply issues. Population growth and energy-extravagant lifestyles are the real underlying reasons why we have an energy crisis. We need to make fundamental changes to our lifestyles that respect nature rather than consume it through our selfish individualistic greed and ambition.
- Second, we need to have a fundamental overhaul of our approaches to environmental impact assessment relating to renewable energy intiatives, that is much more holistic and places greater value on respect for nature and our cultural heritage embedded in rural landscapes. We cannot allow a Secretary of State to over-ride citizen opinion by imposing large infrastructure projects in areas of significant environmental value.[xxvi]
- Third, whilst energy security is an important concern of government, and it is indeed the private sector that is currently the main engine of the economy, governments need to prioritise the interests of all their citizens, and especially the poorest, helpless and most marginalised. The proposed policies seem to serve the interests of global capital more than they do those of the majority of citizens in the UK. It is the interests of the business sector that are now driving renewable energy development, and these insufficiently address the holistic impact of their technologies on nature.[xxvii] We therefore need to provide much more training to those in private and public sector renewable energy companies about the holistic character of environmental impact, including the importance of cultural heritage in relevant decision making processes.
This is an important moment for British society, and a change in government always provides an opportunity for the introduction of beneficial new policies and practices. The government’s intention to address energy security and the environmental impact of energy production is to be applauded, but, and it’s a big but, these proposals seem likely to do more harm than good. Many people might feel better off as a result in the short-term, but the long-term environmental impacts of these proposals are likely to result in irretrievable harm to the British natural and cultural environment. It may be that people in government and large swathes of our society, many of whom live modern urban and suburban lifestyles, do not really care. I am sure that I am in a minority, but when our children’s children grow up in a world divorced from lived reality in nature, they will not only have broken the link with their past cultural heritage, but they will have no way of reclaiming it physically. It will become merely a virtual memory, and it will be too late to retrieve that important element of being truly human that is encapsulated in our rural landscapes. The labour of countless rural “peasants” that is encapsulated and represented in these landscapes will be obliterated and made inaccessible for ever from our lived experience because of our modern, technology-driven ignorance and greed.
[i] See the work of the Digital-Environment System Coalition DESC at https://ict4d.org.uk/desc and Unwin, T. (2022) “Climate Change” and Digital Technologies: redressing the balance of power (Part 1), https://timunwin.blog/2022/11/10/climate-change-and-digital-technologies-redressing-the-balance-of-power-part-1/
[ii] Air conditioning in 2023 was estimated to represent about 20% of total electricity use worldwide, and 10% of use in the UK, but total usage is likely to increase in the future (Khosravi, F., Lowes, R, Ugalde-Loo, C.E. (2023) Cooling is hotting up in the UK, Energy Policy, 174, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.enpol.2023.113456.)
[iii] See also Department for Business, Energy & Industrial Strategy (2022) UK Energy in Brief, UK: National Statistics, https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/media/63ca75288fa8f51c836cf486/UK_Energy_in_Brief_2022.pdf; and Energy Dashboard, https://www.energydashboard.co.uk.
[iv] Miliiband, E. (2024) Great British Energy founding statement: Secretary of State forward, https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/introducing-great-british-energy/great-british-energy-founding-statement.
[v] Taylor, H. (2022) How energy prices will play out, Investors’ Chronicle, https://www.investorschronicle.co.uk/content/cae53ff0-a422-5858-b619-9ccb21a00be6.
[vi] See also my COP 27, loss and damage, and the reality of Carbon emissions, and “Climate Change” and Digital Technologies: redressing the balance of power (Part 1)
[vii] World Economic Forum (2019) UK’s energy consumption is lower than it was in 1970, https://www.weforum.org/agenda/2019/08/uk-energy-same-as-50-years-ago/.
[viii] Mavrokefalidis, D. (2024) UK energy bible shows demand plummets to 1950s levels, Energy Live News, https://www.energylivenews.com/2024/07/30/uk-energy-bible-shows-demand-plummets-to-1950s-levels/.
[ix] Gov.uk (2024) Policy statement on onshore wind, 8 July 2024, https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/policy-statement-on-onshore-wind/policy-statement-on-onshore-wind.
[x] Mullane, J. (2024) Experts react to Ed Miliband lifting ban on onshore wind farms, Homebuilding & Renovating, 11 July 2024, https://www.homebuilding.co.uk/news/experts-react-to-ed-miliband-lifting-ban-on-onshore-wind-farms
[xi] Pratley, N. (2024) Labour lifts Tories’ ‘absurd’ ban on onshore windfarms, The Guardian, 8 July 2024, https://www.theguardian.com/environment/article/2024/jul/08/labour-lifts-ban-onshore-windfarms-planning-policy. See also, Vaughan, A. and Smyth, C. (2024) Ed Miliband scraps de facto ban on onshore wind farms, The Times, 9 July 2024, https://www.thetimes.com/uk/politics/article/ed-miliband-onshore-wind-farms-ban-gtqjvqhrm.
[xii] For a selection of relevant UK procedures, see https://www.gov.uk/guidance/environmental-impact-assessment, https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/media/5a7c406eed915d7d70d1d981/geho0411btrf-e-e.pdf, https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/media/5b4cd2c9e5274a732b817d49/SECR_and_CRC_Final_IA__1_.pdf, https://www.legislation.gov.uk/uksi/2017/572/contents, https://www.gov.uk/guidance/offshore-energy-strategic-environmental-assessment-sea-an-overview-of-the-sea-process, https://rpc.blog.gov.uk/2021/11/10/considering-environmental-issues-in-impact-assessments/,
[xiii] An interesting new approach recently adopted by the Dutch government for offshore auctions focuses instead heavily on non-price indicators, including attention to the ecosystem and possible negative effects on birds and marine habitats https://windeurope.org/newsroom/news/new-dutch-offshore-auctions-focus-heavily-on-non-price-criteria/. My thanks to Will Cleverly for bringing this example to my attention.
[xiv] See for example, Pratley, N. (2023) The next UK net zero battleground is electricity pylons, The Guardian, 26 September 2023, https://www.theguardian.com/business/nils-pratley-on-finance/2023/sep/26/the-next-uk-net-zero-battleground-is-electricity-pylons; Davies, S. (2024) Sparking a crucial debate: the problem with pylons, NESTA, https://www.nesta.org.uk/feature/future-signals-2024/the-problem-with-pylons/; Energy Networks Association (2024) Explainer – building new pylons in the UK, ENA, 5 July 2024, https://www.energynetworks.org/newsroom/explainer-building-new-pylons-in-the-uk.
[xv] See for example, Partington, R. (2024) Labour told it will need to defeat ‘net-zero nimbys’ to decarbonise Britain, The Guardian, 22 July 2024, https://www.theguardian.com/environment/article/2024/jul/22/labour-decarbonise-britain-resolution-foundation-report-net-zero-nimbys.
[xvi] National Grid (2023) National Grid energise world’s first T-pylons, https://www.nationalgrid.com/national-grid-energise-worlds-first-t-pylons.
[xvii] See Xlinks, One world, one sun, one grid, https://xlinks.co – thanks again to Will Cleverly for this example.
[xviii] Department for Energy Security & Net Zero (2023) Energy consumption in the UK (ECUK) 1970 to 2022, https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/media/651422e03d371800146d0c9e/Energy_Consumption_in_the_UK_2023.pdf.
[xix] CREDS (2024) Spatial variation in household energy consumption, showing the average total energy use (per person rather than per household) for each Lower Super Output Area (LSOA) in England and Wales, CREDS, https://www.creds.ac.uk/publications/curbing-excess-high-energy-consumption-and-the-fair-energy-transition/, 30 July 2024. See also my 2013 piece on Valuing the impact of wind turbines on rural landscapes: Conca de Barberà, as well as other writings, including Unwin, T. (2023) Experiencing digital environment interactions in the “place” of Geneva (Session 403): the DESC Walk
[xx] See for example the maps in Department for Energy Security & Net Zero (2024) Subnational electricity and gas consumption statistics, https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/media/65b12dfff2718c000dfb1c9b/subnational-electricity-and-gas-consumption-summary-report-2022.pdf.
[xxi] Miliiband, E. (2024) Great British Energy founding statement: Secretary of State forward, https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/introducing-great-british-energy/great-british-energy-founding-statement.
[xxii] Labour (2024) Make Britain a clean energy superpower, https://labour.org.uk/change/make-britain-a-clean-energy-superpower/.
[xxiii] Miliiband, E. (2024) Great British Energy founding statement: Secretary of State forward, https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/introducing-great-british-energy/great-british-energy-founding-statement.
[xxiv] Ambrose, J. (2024) Labour must speed up wind power expansion or miss targets, says renewables industry, The Guardian, 29 July 2024, https://www.theguardian.com/environment/article/2024/jul/29/labour-must-speed-up-wind-power-expansion-or-miss-targets-says-renewables-industry.
[xxv] Green Party (2024) Great British Energy – not the real change we need, https://greenparty.org.uk/2024/05/30/great-british-energy-not-the-real-change-we-need/
[xxvi] It can be noted that “unspoilt” rural landscape in the UK is becoming scarcer and scarcer – and thus more precious. While this is in large part because of increasing population and affluence, it is also morally wrong that urban elites (as well as the urban and the elites generally) should impose their personal prejudices and biases that will harm rural landscapes that they do not understand or value. Moreover, significant destruction of the physical environment is also likely negatively to impact tourism revenue as cherished landscapes are changed by the construction of windfarms and mega-solar installations. The CLA estimates that “Rural tourism accounts for 70-80% of all domestic UK tourism and adds £14.56bn to England and Wales’ Gross Value Added” (CLA, supporting rural tourism in England, 21 March 2024, https://www.cla.org.uk/news/supporting-rural-tourism-in-england/).
[xxvii] Many people working for companies in the sector do so because of their commitment to environmental well-being, but often those trained as engineers and scientists do not have a sufficient understanding of the physical and cultural environment impacted by their technologies.
power of the computer (perhaps female) that is actually most valued. Moreover, the use of USB “sticks”, often phallic in shape, can be seen as a clear example of this male/female gendering associated with heterosexual sex. The use of such sticks to infect computers with viruses can also, for example, be likened to the spread of sexually transmitted diseases in humans. The shift away from the use of such male and female connectors to the increasingly common use of WiFi and Bluetooth can in turn perhaps be seen as one way through which this gendering might be being broken down, although much more research needs to be done to explore the gendering of all aspects of digital technologies.
Tim Unwin's Blog 