We won’t let local opposition block energy projects, UK minister says

READING — The government will not let local campaigners block its “nationally important” mission to build clean energy schemes across the U.K., Energy Minister Michael Shanks vowed.

Britain’s new Labour government has promised to build more climate-friendly infrastructure — including wind and solar farms — as well as bulking up the electricity grid with miles of new electricity pylons.

It’s a bid to hit Labour’s end-of-decade goal of cleaning up the power system.  But MPs from all the main parties, including Labour itself, have already sounded the alarm about the prospect of new building in their constituencies.

Shanks told POLITICO in an interview Thursday that Prime Minister Keir Starmer had been “really clear that we’re going to build that stuff, because it’s really, really critically important.”

While promising to work alongside local people, Shanks insisted the government will push ahead with its plans.

“We want to do this with communities,” he said. “We don’t want to force things on communities. But there will come a point where we have to recognize the national importance of the infrastructure, and it will have to get built somewhere.”

The country’s National Energy System Operator (NESO), which oversees Britain’s energy system, said earlier this month that the government will need to nearly double onshore wind capacity and treble solar in order to meet its promise to remove fossil fuels almost entirely from the energy supply by 2030.

Energy Secretary Ed Miliband greenlit four huge solar farms within days of taking office, projects opposed by some local groups but which developers say could bring power to hundreds of thousands of homes.

The U.K. will also need to build around twice as much grid infrastructure in the next five years as in the last decade, NESO said.

“The problem is we can’t just keep saying: ‘Yes, we need the infrastructure, but please don’t build it here.’ At some point it has to get built, and we’re determined to do that,” Shanks said.

Ministers insist that communities will “feel the benefit” of hosting local energy projects, while promising that bills across the country would fall.

The government will be doing more to “make the case” about the need for new infrastructure, Shanks said, while details on potential benefits for communities hosting new projects — such as money off bills or direct payments — is coming “really soon.”

Officials are also working on new plans to cut backlogs in the planning system to get more energy infrastructure up and running, while a blueprint for reaching the clean power target is due before the end of the year.

“We’re not removing any element of consultation by streamlining the planning system,” Shanks said. “We just want it to move faster.”