Q220 Mr. Dave Anderson: I have read the documentation and the figures and I understand where you are coming from, but why do you think the draft energy NPS fails to justify the need for new conventional generating capacity?

Mr Bullock: I am going to just look at the Government's argument here. The Government is arguing that there is a need and it says there is a significant need for all types of electricity generation. It bases that one some figures in the NPS. This is in our written evidence, but I will try and explain our thinking on it. The Government says that by 2020 we will need 43 gigawatts of new generating capacity. That takes into account the planned closures as well, the coal fired stations closing in the middle of this decade. The Government says that of that 43, 26 of it will be renewables and 17 will be non-renewables. It also says that 20 gigawatts of this 43 is underway, already consented to, being built or already built, and there is a parliamentary question answered by the Government last week which said that of that 20, 14 gigawatts is non-renewable already. So of the 17 gigawatts that the Government is saying it needs from non-renewable sources, the Government is also saying that 14 of that has already been built. On top of that there is a large number of applications in the existing planning system which are not counted in those figures but which will get dealt with before the IPC makes its decisions and in those applications outstanding there is at least 7 gigawatts of new gas in there. So assuming that they will go through - and it is pretty likely they will get through - that will mean that 21 gigawatts of non-renewable capacity to 2020 is already predicted to be being built and the Government itself is saying, "We only need 17 gigawatts of new non-renewable capacity." I am sorry to throw lots of figures at you, but to our mind our analysis of that is that the Government has set out a case for a significant need for all types but its own figures show that it is already meeting that need for non-renewable types. So we feel that the Government has not made a case for a significant need for all types and that case needs robust scrutiny by yourselves and other people to come to some conclusion about whether or not that is genuinely viable, because it seems that it is such an important central plank of their analysis that we need all types but their figures do not back that up.

Mr Allott: I agree with that and I think in the assessment of types the different narratives get thrown together, about the need for lots of new base load capacity or the need for lots of new capacity to generate in the sense that we need to have lots and lots of gigawatts of everything without then differentiation in the NPS to even guide that as to what type of capacity even on the Government's figures we should be looking for. The assessment is by other people. A good report was done by Pöyry last year, pre-recession, and through several new gas stations being consented - that was conducted by Greenpeace, WWF and RSPB - showed that actually the renewable energy targets and energy efficiency targets would actually keep the lights on until the mid 2020s. Other reports by the National Grid and Pöyry also confirmed that. Likewise, the concerns about the variability of wind. We think it is very good, so you do not get intermittency, showing that it is much more manageable than many people like to say. Therefore, the need for any new occasional stand-by capacity is also much less than is currently claimed, but these figures are often lumped together to create a very scary sounding "big new gigawatts" and without any definition of what that means. We do not think that is very helpful, the way that has been put in the NPS, in terms of the thinking and the framing because it does read as though the IPC could read this and say that any gigawatt that comes along is fine, and that is not actually what we need to see for a new energy system.

Q221 Mr. Dave Anderson: Is one of the concerns from the Government that the renewable industry may not deliver the difference in the figures you went through, and if they can deliver it would only be at considerably higher cost than what the alternatives would be?

Mr Bullock: It could be, but the NPS is saying, the Government is saying, "This is what we anticipate. This is what we are planning to do," and I would imagine that the Government's response to concerns - and there are concerns - that it would not necessarily happen is that we must strengthen policy.

Mr Allott: I would remind people that it is also a legally binding target that we signed up to only just over a year ago, so I would hope that we do really try and meet it.

Q222 Mr. Dave Anderson: What is legally binding?

Mr Allott: The renewables target.

Mr Bullock: Just one other thing to quickly mention about the figures as well is that I gave figures for 2020 and people will rightly make the argument about, "Hang on, we need a lot more capacity beyond 2020, new stock by say 2025 and 2030. Again, it is in our written evidence but the same analysis of the Government's figures holds for 2025 as well.

Q223 Mr. Dave Anderson: Is there not a concern, because we are facing at the moment a potential shortage in security of supply? In effect it is a belt and braces job. Why not build what might end up being extra capacity but just to make sure that it is there, which could include, as the Government says, all types, whether it was more nuclear, whether it was proven, say CCS coal power stations?

Mr Allott: I think the reality is that a lot of technologies take a long time to build. Regardless of what you think about nuclear, we do not think it is necessary or needed, but you certainly would be building it as part of the response to a perceived near-term security of supply problem, even the most optimistic assessments, as long as you get it commissioned -

Q224 Mr. Dave Anderson: But you would know it would work in terms of generating electricity? There is no argument about that, is there?

Mr Ayliffe: Well, you say that, but the new designs have not passed all of the regulatory assessments yet, and this is a technology they are suggesting we build here that has never been built anywhere in the world. There is an assumption that it will work, but that is not backed up by where it is through the design assessment process or licensing.

Mr Allott: We have seen some very good news just the other week about offshore wind, going to 40 gigawatts of offshore wind. We think that is a very good development that needs to be built on and driven forward. The alternative is building lots of coal and gas and then hoping that it will be shut down if it is not necessary. I suspect that the investors in that might have a different view. The industry is actually going for gas probably more than I think any of us would like at the moment, but to be honest if it is a choice between gas and coal we do not like the use of gas and we think it is very wasteful to do it in a way which does not maximise the heat recovery. On pure lock in grounds - and this is not in any way to endorse new gas, but a new gas station will last little more than half the length of a coal station in terms of its design lifetime and the emissions are half as high per year, so in terms of the lock-in problem there is serious concern and there are concerns about whether CCS should be required for gas. We believe it should and that gas should be taken about as seriously as the reality for their planning, but the real problem is the lock-in for coal. We do not think it is necessary if we really go seriously for energy efficiency and demand management, which are always the priorities and the smartest thing to do for your economy, and then go for renewables where the potential for new jobs and exports is greatest.

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Q239 John Robertson: So are you saying there should not be a repository then because there is not one somewhere else? Is that what you are saying?

Ms McSorley: No, what we are saying is that there may not be one, but you have no occasional experience -

Mr. Dave Anderson: But there does not have to be one. I will move on because we are not going to get anywhere on this one, unless Simon or Keith, or even the Professor wants to -

Q240 Chairman: For the guidance of the Committee and for the witnesses, the purpose of this afternoon's session is to look at the NPSs, in this instance particularly the nuclear NPS, and look at the content of that and could then critique it or otherwise as a document which is either fit for its purpose, which is an NPS document relating to the whole structure of the IPC and what follows from that, and not necessarily to state a case either for or against nuclear power. I think we appreciate that witnesses this afternoon have in general a negative view of the wisdom of nuclear power and indeed they have been questioned by a Member who has a positive view of nuclear power, but if we can steer between those two poles in terms of what are the issues concerning the NPS and its validity or otherwise then I think we will be able to proceed constructively and would invite you to talk about that.

Mr Ayliffe: Thank you. Yes, of course. Our principal line on nuclear, just to reiterate it, is that we do not think that we do need it and that is fine, but certainly on the issue of what is in the NPS, I think it is important. You can just see the size of the thing. There is an awful lot of emphasis in the whole NPS process on nuclear and we worked out that there are something like 1600 pages that somebody would have to read to get through, to actually have an idea of getting their head round, say, what was going on at Sizewell, comparing what was going on there with somewhere like Bradwell, looking at justification, which is an awful lot to get your head around. It is a very, very complex issue. That said, the problem we have with it fundamentally is that there are gaping holes around very significant issues such as spent nuclear fuel and that is something that I think the Committee really should look at because, as I mentioned before we broke up, it strikes us that given the lack of concrete proposals around dealing with spent nuclear fuel from new build the IPC will be forced to accept effectively the promises of the nuclear industry that they will at some point possibly, they assume, find a way of safely dealing with spent nuclear fuel on site. That is an extraordinary assumption for the IPC to have to make and I think certainly on the issue of whether or not this document does what it says on the tin, that is a key issue which we think you should bear in mind.

Professor Blowers: We are going to come to the issue of nuclear waste, as I understand it, and I did not really want to talk about it at the moment because in framing this debate there seems to me an issue that is relevant to the documents and that is how these documents have been consulted upon themselves and I wondered if you might just let me say something on that, because I think the consultation process is fundamental and I think it is very flawed. The NPS process so far, which has been preceded, of course, by the Strategic Siting Assessment and various other things, does not encourage, it seems to me, effective and democratic participation, particularly on the part of those - and I do represent some of those - who are at the sites themselves. I find the documents in terms of fit for purpose are actually, particularly the nuclear ones, tendentious, vague and they are poorly integrated. That is a very serious problem in terms of a consultation process because a document ultimately needs to reflect what it has heard in terms of the consultation. If you try and take this, instead of from the Olympian heights of parliamentarians, down to the citizen whom you are trying to attract to be consulted or even community groups the situation you face is that you have got three consultations occurring at the same time. That is one problem. Secondly, the whole process is completely unmanageable. You have got a whole series of blue tombstones, of which this is just one, a colossal amount of documentation both in weight and in volume in terms of reading and if you are going to be knowledgeable you need all the background stuff as well, which most people do not have, and I will not go into all of that that you need. Now, the 16 and 74 pages which people are saying you have to read in my view is neither here nor there because you cannot skim some of this stuff if you want to respond. So it is very, very difficult to navigate and select and understand and basically know what you are talking about. So the impression one gets form below is that this tonne weight of stuff is being thrust upon people, almost saying to them, "You can't possibly respond to this, can you? It's just too unmanageable." The second thing is, it is unfair because if you look at the documents and read them seriously and do an analysis they are designed to achieve an objective and that objective is to get something like ten sites up and running as fast as possible. That is basically what it is about and everything is designed to that. So the process is very rapid, the process is sequential and it is cumulative, and therefore you cannot go back on certain decisions that have been taken, and you ought to be able to, in my judgment, it should be iterative. The scope is more and more narrowed down so at the point where communities are asked to communicate their feelings already major decisions have been taken before they really get a look in, and of course it is unresponsive. We do not know what happens to our comments. We have made a myriad of comments. Many of them are ignored and they come back in a sort of vague and bland document, "Yes, we have taken this into account..." and almost no changes whatsoever were made to the strategic assessment criteria. If you look at that, they are virtually the same and the changes they made were more technical than substantive. So people below think the whole thing is unresponsive. Lastly, it is biased because if you look at the sources for all the material they are basically technical, industrial consultants who are in the nuclear game who are writing the stuff. Now, I am a social scientist. I know a huge literature in social science. It is very critical of the nuclear industry. Never is that cited in these things. There itself, I think, is a bias. Then you have the situation when you are trying to get consultations with people who are hard pressed, who are working part-time, they are volunteers and they are unpaid, and they are up against the totality of power that is produced by the masses of money that go into this whole pro-nuclear thing. Ultimately, therefore, the process is skewed. I was on the CoRWM Committee. I was also on the RAWMAC Committee. We undertook, certainly with CoRWM, an extremely detailed public and stakeholder engagement process and got public confidence in our proposals. This took place over three years. What is happening now is a complete travesty, it seems to me, of an effort to try and involve people and you will see in the documents that are coming to you in the written form the sheer frustration that people are feeling about this. They are overwhelmed by it, they are frustrated by it and they say, "Well, what the hell! This process is there simply to outgun us and to make sure that these power stations, willy-nilly, with their spent fuel stores, are planted in existing locations." I want to come to the question of siting in a moment, but I do feel you need to understand that a document in a sense cannot be fit for purpose if it is so biased and so difficult for consultees and therefore the consultees you will be talking to no doubt next week are the privileged ones. They have privileged access, they have all the power, they have all the time and do make a massive input into this. Now, those of us, if you like, at the bottom of the tree do not have the opportunity and there is immense frustration out there, and I do want you to understand that.

This is an uncorrected transcript of evidence taken in public and reported to the House. The transcript has been placed on the internet on the authority of the Committee. Neither witnesses nor Members have had the opportunity to correct the record. The transcript is not yet an approved formal record of these proceedings.

The full transcript may be read here.

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