Energy Bill — Onshore Wind Power — Ceasing to Count Towards Renewables Obligation — 20 Apr 2016 at 14:20

The majority of MPs voted not to relax the imposition of cut-off date after which new on-shore electricity generating wind turbines would cease to be considered renewable energy sources for the purpose of a legal requirement on generators to produce a certain amount of energy from renewable sources.

Section 32 of the Electricity Act 1989 titled: Obligation in connection with electricity from renewable sources enables a Secretary of State to require electricity suppliers to provide certain amounts of electricity generated by using renewable sources during specified periods.

The Energy Bill as proposed stated that in order to count towards the renewables obligation a station or the additional capacity would have to have received planning permission, accepted a grid connection offer and secured land rights by the cut off date.

The proposal rejected in this vote was to allow schemes where planning permission had been varied after the cut off date to count as generation from renewable resources.

MPs were considering the Energy Bill^[1].

The motion passed by the majority of MPs was:

• That this House disagrees with Lords amendment 7T.

The rejected Lords amendment 7T was an amendment to Commons amendment 7 and stated^[2]

• Line 145, after “2015,” insert “regardless of whether it was varied after that date by any planning permission, consent or development consent issued under section 73 of the Town and Country Planning Act 1990 (determination of applications to develop land without compliance with conditions previously attached), section 42 of the Town and Country Planning (Scotland) Act 1997 (determination of applications to develop land without compliance with conditions previously attached), section 36C of this Act (variation of consents under section 36) or under the Planning Act 2008,”

Commons amendment 7^[3] sought to introduce a new clause titled: "Onshore wind power: circumstances in which certificates may be issued after 31 March 2016".

The amendment is not marked up with line numbers in any of the published materials. Using the context of other amendments it applies to the proposed new section 32LJ which the clause would have inserted in the Electricity Act 1989. The proposed new clause 32LJ was titled: The approved development condition, the rejected amendment applied specifically to subsection (4) which set out the evidence required that the development had been approved prior to the cut-off date:

• (4)The documents specified in this subsection are—
• (a) evidence that—
• (i)planning permission for the station or additional capacity was granted on or before 18 June 2015, and
• (ii) any conditions as to the time period within which the development to which the permission relates must be begun have not been breached

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• [1] Parliament's webpage on the Energy Bill
• [2] Amendment paper containing Lords' amendment 7T
• [3] Amendment paper containing Commons amendment 7

Debate in Parliament |