Delivering green, zero-carbon energy is fundamental to a green recovery and meeting our 2030 climate target.
Scotland has enviable renewable energy resources and, despite the missed opportunities of the past, we can still create a globally-significant industry, capable of accelerating the transition to a net-zero economy, creating well-paid green jobs, and laying the foundation for a just and prosperous economy.
Scottish Green achievements in the last 5 years include:
Onshore wind is the cheapest and most advanced renewable energy available, but it is stagnating and has not delivered the supply chain jobs that were once promised thanks to neglect by the UK and Scottish Governments.
The Scottish Greens are committed to restoring the role of onshore wind in Scotland. We will support the upgrading of existing wind farms, which will see older turbines replaced with fewer, more powerful models, and the delivery of an additional 8GW of onshore wind by 2030. This means installing 1GW - about 200 turbines - every year for a decade, doubling the size of the industry.
This additional capacity will be required to help meet the demand generated by the switch of heat and transport to electricity, and to produce green hydrogen where necessary.. Over the 2020s this plan will create 3,200 new jobs in the onshore wind sector, stimulate £6.9bn in investment, and create a further 3,000 jobs indirectly in the supply chain.
It will save the typical household £50 a year in the long term and will be achieved without public subsidy, as part of a deal with the sector that includes:
Hydropower drove Scotland’s original renewables revolution and now a new generation of smaller scale projects have the potential to support rural communities and provide stable electricity supply for centuries to come. We will support a subsidy and non-domestic rates regime that realises this growth whilst respecting environmental constraints.
Scotland has big plans for offshore wind, but the main delivery mechanism is Contracts for Difference, a subsidy reserved to Westminster and allocated by competitive tendering across the UK. This means there is significant risk that we will not be able to deliver for the sector. We also have an enormous tidal power resource, but the support that is needed to develop it into a world leading industry is not in place. We believe that energy should be fully devolved, allowing Scotland to build the energy system of the future we need and want.
The Scottish Greens will set a target of 1GW of installed tidal energy in Scotland by 2030, creating at least 4,000 green jobs and putting us at the leading edge of a global industry. To deliver this, we will request an emergency derogation to allow the Scottish Government to create a long-term support programme for tidal power. This will be based on a feed-in tariff and aligned behind an aim of delivering 1GW by 2030 requiring £130m of public investment per year until 2030. In the absence of a derogation of this power to Scotland, a proportion of Contracts for Difference should be ring-fenced for tidal power and given at a strike price that makes projects viable.
In addition we will:
The Scottish Green approach to a green recovery is based on the principle of a just transition - a managed process of economic change that is fair and equitable and that means no one is left behind.
We have the green technologies we need to tackle the climate emergency, and a green recovery should focus on these rather than unproven and environmentally dangerous solutions.
The Scottish Greens will:
There is at least three times more fossil fuel in extractable global reserves than we can burn if we are to keep our climate safe. In the UK, we have 5.7 billion barrels of oil and gas in already-operating fields that alone would push the UK beyond the limits set out in the Paris Climate agreement. We will support the progressive phase out of North Sea oil and gas production based on the principles of a Just Transition. This is essential to protect the livelihoods and economic well-being of workers and communities, preventing a deferred collapse.
We will call on the UK Government to:
We will also:
Support green jobs and skills development
Oppose new fossil fuel infrastructure
Ensure the Scottish Government can deliver the transition to net-zero
Deliver a just transition for Mossmorran and Grangemouth