Energy Secretary Chris Huhne said the country will not miss its own carbon-reduction targets because of delays over planning permission.
– Edited by Chris Reed –
According to a report in Bloomberg, Britain's first new nuclear power station will open in 2018. Energy Secretary Chris Huhne said the country will not miss its own carbon-reduction targets because of delays over planning permission.
"We're on course," Huhne told BBC Radio 4's "Today" show. "We have very clear signals from investors that they are going ahead. I've absolutely no intention of the lights going out on my watch."
He was responding to a report from the Confederation of British Industry that planning delays are putting carbon- emission and energy-security targets goals in jeopardy. As much as 150 billion pounds ($238 billion) of private investment is at risk because energy policy is unclear, the business lobby said.
The U.K. has pledged to get 15 percent of its energy from renewable sources by 2020, a sevenfold jump from 2008, and reduce carbon-dioxide emissions by 80 percent below 1990 levels by 2050.
As much as 1 trillion pounds of investment may be needed over the next two decades to replace and upgrade power systems and cut emissions at factories, homes and transportation, according to a June 29 report by the Green Investment Bank Commission.
"Energy companies are unable to get the ball rolling on new infrastructure projects when it is unclear how the future planning regime will work," CBI Deputy Director-General John Cridland said in a statement accompanying the group's report.
Huhne said while he couldn't say where the new plants will be built, they were likely to be on sites of existing nuclear generators, where there was already public support for the technology.
According to the CBI, other issues that need to be addressed by the end of February include speeding up the development of carbon-capture and storage technologies and greater clarity on electricity market reform. The government needs to have completed consultations on a carbon-floor price by that time, the lobby group said.