{"id":2659,"date":"2023-03-01T15:17:57","date_gmt":"2023-03-01T15:17:57","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.sussex.ac.uk\/sussexenergygroup\/?p=2659"},"modified":"2024-01-29T11:41:45","modified_gmt":"2024-01-29T11:41:45","slug":"is-there-an-electoral-politics-of-the-allocation-of-industrial-decarbonisation-resources","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.sussex.ac.uk\/sussexenergygroup\/2023\/03\/01\/is-there-an-electoral-politics-of-the-allocation-of-industrial-decarbonisation-resources\/","title":{"rendered":"Is there an electoral politics of the allocation of industrial decarbonisation resources?"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
\"\"<\/a>
Houses of Parliament. Located in London, England, UK. Original public domain image from Wikimedia Commons<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

One of the more challenging aspects of the net zero agenda is how to decarbonise heavy industry. Industries such as metals (including iron and steel), minerals, chemicals, food and drink, paper and pulp, ceramics, glass and oil refineries account for about 16% of UK territorial emissions, both from energy use and from carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases produced directly from industrial processes, such as calcination in the production of cement<\/a>. Industry is commonly seen as a \u2018hard to abate\u2019 sector of the economy. A lot of industry is also exposed to international competition, so unless there is support from government there is a risk that it will close down and relocate, rather than actually cut emissions.<\/p>\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n

Having made progress on the decarbonisation of electricity the UK, like many other countries, is now giving much greater focus to this agenda. As laid out in the 2021 Industrial Decarbonisation Strategy<\/a>, the centrepiece of the UK\u2019s approach is to slash emissions in a number of industrial clusters around the UK, with key roles for carbon capture and storage and for hydrogen. This approach has been backed by revenue support for high carbon industrial emitters to pay for carbon capture, and a new regulatory framework for carbon transport and storage similar to that in gas and electricity networks. Similar proposals for hydrogen are also being developed. In addition, \u00a31 billion of grant support for carbon capture and storage infrastructure is being made available.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

While the final level of support is as yet unknown, what is clear is where the initial funding for CCS and hydrogen will go. Two clusters \u2013 the North West cluster around Merseyside centred on the Hynet<\/a> hydrogen project, and the East Coast cluster<\/a> with hubs at Humberside and Teesside \u2013 have been designated as \u2018Track 1\u2019 clusters, meaning that projects will go ahead in the first phase of the strategy.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Other locations designated as industrial clusters in the UK, Southampton\/Solent, South Wales, the Black Country, and the Scottish cluster linking Grangemouth and Aberdeen, are currently waiting for the development of a Track 2 framework of support. Scotland has been designated a \u2018reserve\u2019 cluster meaning that it would become Track 1 if one of the existing Track 1 clusters dropped out, although observers<\/a> think there is little chance of this.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This pattern of early resource allocation is a consequence of an approach that prioritises efficiency in emissions reduction, i.e. focus on those regions where large proportions of emissions are concentrated. However, it also leads in practice to regional inequality in where funds flow, made more significant by the fact that most of the clusters include areas of high deprivation, historical job loss and under-investment. This inequality across the clusters has not gone unnoticed, and one question sometimes raised is whether there is a party political dimension, related to the \u2018Red Wall\u2019 phenomenon, where the Conservative Party won a number of traditionally Labour-held seats at the 2019 election in the north-west and north-east of England and want to hang on to them. This issue echoes debates over the allocation of the Towns Fund<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\n

Voters in Conservative seats got almost \u00a320 more per head than those in similarly deprived non-Tory constituencies in latest round of levelling up funding – \u2066@guardian<\/a>\u2069 analysis https:\/\/t.co\/6QjBHBbB1X<\/a><\/p>— Pippa Crerar (@PippaCrerar) January 19, 2023<\/a><\/blockquote>