My Lords, I am grateful to my noble friends Lord Jenkin and Lord Roper for tabling the amendment and prompting debate on the issue of using UK-sourced woody biomass for electricity.
The amendment would give the Government powers to set limits on the amount of UK-sourced wood used by each biomass power plant. As I outlined in Committee, one of the aims of the Government’s bioenergy strategy is that any support should consider the consequences of policy interventions on the wider energy system and economy, including non-energy industries. It is the Government’s view that where this and the other aims listed in the UK Bioenergy Strategy are met, bioenergy can make a significant contribution to meeting our renewable energy, energy security and emissions-reduction needs at low cost.
We have taken a number of measures that we believe are sufficient to ensure that the biomass policy meets this aim. The department made an assessment of the amount of woody biomass that may be available to the UK without significant impacts on other sectors.
We then made an assessment of the amount of UK woody biomass that is likely to be used by electricity companies, which was well within the forecast availability. We have since then put in place measures to monitor these forecasts and their level of accuracy. We asked large-scale electricity generators using woody biomass to disclose to us on a voluntary basis the amount of UK wood that they estimate they will procure and use over the next five years, and we require this information to be signed off by the company’s board. We are pleased to say that all the operators responded to our request for information on their wood procurement. The department has now aggregated and published this data, and we will undertake to do this annually. The data provided by the operators supports the original forecast of wood use for electricity. Domestic wood supplies will not be their target.
In addition, we have aggregated the results of the sustainability reports that generators are required to provide to Ofgem. We have also now published on the website this aggregated data for the years 2009 to 2012. They also support the original departmental estimates of wood use for electricity and show that wood demand has remained within, rather than risen above, the 1.3 to 1.6 million oven-dried tonnes per annum. As well as these specific measures covering UK wood, the Government have made a number of proposals to limit the amount of biomass power that will be brought forward. We have limited the government support that can be claimed by former coal plants until 2027 under the contracts for difference.
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We have set a 400 megawatt cap on the amount of new build dedicated biomass without combined heat and power that can expect to receive support under the renewables obligation band for dedicated biomass and we are proposing not to provide a strike price for new build dedicated biomass electricity under EMR. These proposals will have the result of limiting potential demand for UK wood, therefore reducing the likelihood that this becomes a future concern.
In response to my noble friend Lord Ridley’s question about air pollution from biomass worsening, the large-scale combustion biomass is regulated under the large combustion plant directive. This sets minimum emission limits for a range of polluters for both fossil fuel and biomass plants. This will soon be replaced with tighter emissions controls under the industrial emissions directive. At a smaller scale the combustion of biomass is regulated under a variety of regulations from the Clean Air Act to local planning laws.
Given the measures we have taken and the data we are seeing on demand for UK wood for electricity, we see it as unduly burdensome to impose new limits on individual operators. The key point on which we need to focus is assessing the development of the entire industry, rather than setting limits for individual plants, which could cause unintended consequences and needlessly disrupt this useful technology. I hope my noble friends will be reassured by this and agree to withdraw their amendment.