Chamber and committees

I thought that it would be helpful to bring all the petitions together. I am delighted to be here, as it is the first time that I have appeared before the committee.

These issues are matters of great importance to communities, which I completely understand. The petitions are largely about renewables and low-carbon energy, which represent a large economic opportunity, but they have to be managed in a way that brings people with them. I am serious about the fact that people need to see the benefits of energy developments in Scotland as much as possible. While I have been in post, first as energy minister and now as cabinet secretary, I have tried my best to ensure that we have all the levers, both reserved and devolved, to ensure that that is the case.

Investing in new energy generation and the grid to ensure that energy can securely get to where it is needed is essential for energy security. It is also essential to ensure that we capitalise on the low-carbon energy that Scotland is uniquely placed to generate. It will create thousands of jobs and many opportunities for Scottish businesses. Existing transmission upgrades are required and, to be honest, they are long overdue, because the transmission network is very old and will have been subject to various weather events, which are becoming more ferocious across Scotland. The transmission network can be unstable in places. Last week, during the snowstorms in the north-east and the Highlands, thankfully, there were very few outages and those that we had were short. Last year and the year before that, that was not the case.

Energy systems regulation is largely reserved to the United Kingdom Government. As such, there are issues on which I am only able to seek to influence the UK Government. I will outline those as I talk about the various petitions. I am aware that communities are concerned about the scale of development and the impact that some of those issues, such as battery storage, would have on them as householders. I am happy to talk about that and provide detail on what we are doing to look at some of the issues that have been raised with us.

It is important that we air and discuss all the themes that the petitions raise. I thank everyone who has gone to the trouble of raising a petition. I have had ministerial responsibility for the energy portfolio for three years and have been making the case to successive UK Governments that community benefits associated with developments must be mandatory and that developers’ engagement with communities must be much better and done earlier in the process. I would like there to be updated guidance that is mandated by the UK Government. There have been developments in that space in the past year or so with the new UK Government, which I am able to tell the committee about.

Recent changes that have been made to UK legislation will allow for the introduction of mandatory pre-application engagement and other improvements in the consenting process for large-scale applications. Our planning and consenting systems also ensure that the issues of cumulative impact and the impact on our natural environment will be considered in the decision-making process. Communities should share in our nation’s energy wealth. Last year, communities were offered £30 million a year in community benefits and we are providing support for them to invest in community energy projects through our community and renewable energy resource scheme—CARES. I have ensured that it is resourced to keep pace with the increasing demand for community energy. The ministerial code limits ministers’ ability to engage directly with communities about specific planning applications or developments that may become planning applications, but I am pleased to be able to answer general questions in the round. I look forward to answering the committee’s questions.

I absolutely agree that community engagement varies. I feel very strongly that that should change. There should be a level playing field, and I do not think that community engagement should be voluntary. Regardless of the type of energy that is being produced or the activity within energy infrastructure, community engagement should be mandatory. There should be very strict guidance associated with what good practice looks like. The Scottish Government does not have the levers in that regard, but we have good practice principles. As I said, through the Planning and Infrastructure Act 2025, we have secured the ability for the Scottish ministers to mandate community engagement, which is a very welcome development, because everything around that used to be voluntary.

Such engagement might mean that company A goes into a community to undertake early engagement, with lots of public meetings and many innovative ways of talking with everyone. The company might also make offers of community benefits, work with the community to give them a percentage share of the profits that are associated with the activity, carry out housing retrofit to bring down people’s bills or give the community some kind of endowment to do things that it wants to do in its area. In such cases, neighbouring communities will look at the opportunity that another community is getting and say, ‘‘That’s great. I wish we had that opportunity as well.’’ That is a very positive story.

However, we might have project B, which is of a very similar nature but which is run by a different company that does not do any of that and leaves a very nasty taste in people’s mouths. As far as the public is concerned, the companies are all tarred with the same brush. All that it takes is one company in one area of Scotland—again, let us say the Highlands and Islands—to leave a very bad taste in people’s mouths: it might fail to act in a way that brings the community with it, avoid engaging with or offering anything to the community, or, worse, promise to do things in that community, but then, once the development is through, the community does not see them for dust. There are a number of companies like that and, in future, should another developer—even if it has good intentions—want to do something, it will be told to take a hike.

All the developers should be held to the same standard, which should be mandated at UK level. I also want community benefit to be mandated at UK level. It should not be voluntary; it should be a statutory obligation, whether for battery storage, solar, hydro or onshore wind. That way, everyone will know what is on offer and what they are getting, and developers will all be held to the same standard. Communities should have that engagement and decide how any benefit is used. That dialogue must happen well before the plans are made—it must take place before the application even goes in. Developers or transmission owners should work with communities, understand their concerns and work with them to find engineering solutions, which can then be put into the plans before they get submitted to the ECU, the council or whichever body it is. Developers or transmission owners must also be held to account on delivering the community benefits that they have promised or said that they will give to the community.

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The devolved Governments and the UK Government have commissioned NESO to develop the strategic spatial energy plan. NESO is also developing a regional energy strategic plan for Scotland. Those documents will help to shape the way in which Scotland’s energy infrastructure will need to develop over the coming decades to meet demand and energy security requirements and to assess things such as cumulative effect.

On an individual project basis, cumulative effect is taken into account by the council that determines the applications—at the moment, those are applications for developments that are under 50MW—and by the ECU.

However, not all applications can be predicted. The convener mentioned battery storage, which is an area that has a lot of speculative players. Communities, including my own community, certainly feel the impact of such speculation. They hear word of particular actors that seek to put forward developments—there are lots of actors and they are all speculating. Not all of those developments will go into the application process, but the speculation is enough to make communities feel worried about the cumulative impact. There is probably far more battery storage speculation out there than developments that will come to fruition, but that does not stop communities feeling a bit helpless.

Community engagement is important, and it should not be voluntary. The Planning and Infrastructure Act 2025 now gives us the opportunity to liaise with all stakeholders, including communities, on what they think community engagement should look like. Once we have taken all that evidence and feedback, we will be in a position to say to developers, “This is the mandatory community engagement that you are now subject to and that you must do, and it has been informed by Scotland-wide consultation.” Such consultation will be done in the way that you suggested should have happened in years gone by.

I will get that information—I do not have the tables with all those figures in front of me. We will produce information for the past few years—

For projects under 50MW?

I would have to look back at that. In my time as energy minister—Dr Allan then became the energy minister when I became cabinet secretary—I cannot recall calling in a decision that had been made by a local authority.

You mentioned Spain. At that time, I discussed the issue with someone when I was in Brussels, and actually, it was the generation of wind capacity that brought things back online. However, I take the point more generally. I agree that variety is very important and that, as long as we rely on gas to heat our homes, we need to keep supplying it.

I also think that the UK Government needs to look at the injection of hydrogen into the gas grid. We have the infrastructure, with all the gas pipelines—the gas actually goes in nearby, in my constituency—and they are ready to inject hydrogen into the pipeline as well, which would reduce the amount of associated emissions.

I have pressed the UK Government for more decision making around that. As long as we are using gas, we have to look not only at how we bring down the carbon emissions associated with that but at the various electricity-generating and storage opportunities. We have to look at everything, with one exception, as Fergus Ewing knows very well. I know that he does not agree with his former party’s policy on this, but the SNP’s party policy is that we are against new nuclear.

I also make the point that, regardless of where and how it is generated, electricity needs to fit on a grid, and the grid infrastructure is old and creaking. Until the infrastructure is upgraded throughout the UK, we will have a situation in which we are paying developers to switch off generators.

I have heard different views on that. I am not talking about people in my party, and I will not divulge who I heard those views from—it was at a public event, but I do not feel comfortable saying who they are. They had a completely different view and wanted the status quo to remain.

Okay—I just wanted to clarify that.

I would just note that all the planning regulations that pertain to Scotland have been passed by this Parliament, and that the Parliament put through national planning framework 4. There are also the regulations associated with the Electricity Act 1989, which are in statute, too. Of course, there are also the statutory consultees and the views that they put in. All of that is taken into account by the reporter.

Robert Martin might be able to give you a little bit more legal background on how the reporter operates.

Scottish Water has a critical role to play in that through investment in its infrastructure, and it is well apprised of the potential requirements for water in all communities—it will get that information through councils and local development plans. It will also be mindful of any particular developments that might need water. Scottish Water also knows about the Government’s hydrogen strategy and where population growth and industrial growth are predicted to take place in Scotland.

Of course, individual projects cannot be predicted. There are many different factors relevant to whether hydrogen will become a big player in the energy industry in Scotland. A lot will depend on the market and demand, and a lot will depend on the infrastructure that might be required to get the hydrogen to mainland Europe. You mentioned the fact that the Germans want to use it for making steel, and they are looking at which countries can supply them with it.

Scottish Water cannot predict what applications will come in that will require high water usage. A lot of water will be required not only to produce hydrogen—for example, data centres require coolants and water supply. However, Scottish Water works closely with the Government on its industrial strategy. I have regular meetings with Scottish Water on a range of issues.

We need to get across the message about water scarcity. Scottish Water works with the Scottish Government and the general public on our general water usage, even at household level. Water is not an infinite and cost-free resource. It costs money to get it to the required quality, and we do not want to waste it. We need to get that message across. Businesses pay directly for their water, so they are cognisant of the need not to waste it.

We do not meter water at household level, as is done in England, and we do not want to go down that route. However, in England, where water is metered, people conserve it more. I would prefer us to have a communications campaign for the Scottish public—indeed, Scottish Water does—to get people to think about how much water they use and how they use it.