The government is said to be considering sweeping changes to planning laws to improve Britain’s energy independence.
With the cost of fossil fuels surging, following Russia’s attack on Ukraine, the government is set to unveil a new ‘energy strategy’ that aims to ensure that the UK will be able to meet domestic needs from a mix of renewables and nuclear power and is being discussed as a matter of security, rather than as a way of addressing climate change.
According to Kwasi Kwarteng, the business, energy and industrial strategy secretary, “Ensuring the UK’s clean energy independence is a matter of national security. Putin can set the price of gas, but he can’t directly control the price of renewables and nuclear we generate in the UK.”
However, this push for more renewables and an expansion of nuclear power will need changes to planning rules as planning regulations were tightened significantly under a previous Conservative administration.
Today the focus seems to be far less about clean energy and more about ‘freedom energies’ that will provide the UK with cheap, clean, homegrown power that will reduce our dependence on imported oil and gas.
