The Labour Party has announced plans to double onshore wind, treble solar and quadruple offshore wind in the UK.
This is according to Ed Miliband, shadow secretary of state of climate change and net zero, who announced the plans as part of his speech at the Labour Party conference.
“I am proud that Keir Starmer’s [Leader of the Labour Party] 2030 mission is for the greatest investment in homegrown energy in British history. We’ll double onshore wind. We’ll treble solar. We’ll quadruple offshore wind. We’ll invest in nuclear and hydrogen and carbon capture and tidal power,” Miliband said.
“That’s the new Britain we can build together.”
The speech takes aim at the current Conservative government for their climate negligence. For instance, Miliband touches on the 2015 de facto ban on new onshore wind developments – something that many MPs having been pushing to overturn since its implementation.
The government announced plans to ease the de facto ban on onshore wind in England in September 2023 however the energy industry criticised the move claiming that it “does not do enough for the sector”.
Labour’s pledge to double onshore wind directly appeals to those that have fought to overturn this damaging legislation in England.
Another pledge made by Labour includes quadrupling offshore wind – yet another technology that the energy industry has criticised the Conservative government over due to the recent Contracts for Difference (CfD) scheme.
In Allocation Round 5 (AR5) of CfD, just 3.7GW of projects were granted funding with this figure also representing no offshore wind.
Labour set out plan to ‘rewire Britain’
Labour also set out its plan to “rewire Britain” and unlock £200 billion of private investment to build a clean energy grid. According to a statement released by Labour, the party will “remove the barriers to facilitate the largest upgrade to national transmission infrastructure in a generation”.
One of the biggest aspects included within the plans is the creation of a publicly-owned energy company called GB Energy. Should this be pursued, the organisation would help coordinate the transmission operators to launch a “super-tender” to procure a grid supply chain.
“Labour’s energy policy will take back control of our energy system to deliver clean power and energy independence for Britain. With GB Energy, our publicly owned energy company, we will deliver the grid we need to slash bills for every family and business,” Miliband said.
“The Conservatives are the party of stagnation and delay. Only Labour has a plan to make working people better off – and to give Britain its future back.”
