Shropshire Star

'Encourage businesses to generate their own renewable energy onsite' - Your Letters: June 27

PICTURE FROM THE ARCHIVE: Here’s an image to cool you down as we go into another heatwave weekend. This is an image from January 1979, of the frozen Spaghetti Junction, empty in rush hour. More than 50 miles of the M6 had been closed and the M42 was also shut as the freeze set in with heavy snow.

Plus
Published
Supporting image for story: 'Encourage businesses to generate their own renewable energy onsite' - Your Letters: June 27
PICTURE FROM THE ARCHIVE: Here’s an image to cool you down as we go into another heatwave weekend. This is an image from January 1979, of the frozen Spaghetti Junction, empty in rush hour. More than 50 miles of the M6 had been closed and the M42 was also shut as the freeze set in with heavy snow.

GRID APPROACH IS NOT WORKING

We welcome the Government’s commitment to cut energy bills for thousands of businesses across the country, and have long made clear that current prices are incompatible with the growth, prosperity, and investment that UK industry requires going forward.

But while exemptions from environmental levies offer some immediate relief, they don't tackle the root of the energy cost problem – continued reliance on an overworked and over-constrained grid system. The most effective long-term method to bring down costs, cut carbon emissions, and build energy resilience, is to encourage businesses to generate their own renewable energy onsite.

This ‘behind-the-meter’ system reduces the need for expensive and delayed grid connections for projects and offers businesses long-term price stability and reduced exposure to market volatility.

A serious step to tackling the industrial energy crisis would be a package of measures to support this form of energy generation, potentially mirroring the strategy Ofwat has used to incentivise and encourage water companies to generate on-site energy for their needs. This is the way to a clean and resilient industrial energy system, and a high-growth and high-investment economy.”