‘£140m set for eco scheme, but £100m gone on M4 relief road’
FIRST Minister Mark Drakeford has admitted he understands the frustrations of people over the £100m his government spent on the doomed M4 relief road compared to the £140m he has pledged to help address decarbonisation.
Answering questions put to him at a scrutiny committee held yesterday at Ysgol Bae Baglan, Port Talbot, Mark Drakeford also said he hoped another sidelined project, the Swansea Bay
Tidal Lagoon, could be resurrected.
Throughout the session, Mr Drakeford referred to the £140m earmarked in the draft budget, published in December last year, to meet decarbonisation targets, address climate change and help reverse biodiversity decline in Wales.
But Llyr Gruffyd,
Plaid Cymru AM for north Wales, pointed out that while admirable, it was hard to “boast” about the £140m when “the government didn’t think twice about £100m for one road-building project”.
Addressing the First Minister, Mr Gruffydd said: “I just wanted to pursue this £140m because it does show just what can be done with that kind of sum, then one recalls how the government spent £100m in preparing for the M4 relief road in Newport, which now isn’t going to happen at all.” Mr
Drakeford said he understood why people compared the two figures, but maintained: “It was impossible to pursue a major project such as the M4 where it was required to have a public inquiry.”
While Wales is on target to better its targets to reduce emissions in the power and building sectors by 2020, it is wildly off the mark for transport.
So far, carbon emissions from transport have decreased by 4.5%, way off the target of 14%.
Long term, Wales has accepted a target to cut carbon emissions by 95% by 2050.
Mr Drakeford said: “Wales is particularly exposed to certain sorts of emissions, which is why the UK Committee on Climate Change (UKCCC) did not declare a 100% target for Wales for 2050.
“It recognised our power generation sector and our reliance on heavy industry.”
Asked whether he thought tidal and marine power was a viable option to help Wales get there, and if the Swansea Bay Tidal Lagoon could be resurrected, Mr Drakeford said he was “hopeful”.
“Of course we hope the UK Government will change its mind,” he said, adding that Wales had already moved on and “active plans” for tidal power were being developed elsewhere in the country.
“Swansea is still in the lead but it’s no longer the only player in this field,” Mr Drakeford said.
Cost is a major stumbling block for the emerging technology, and the First Minister called on the UK Government not to be short-sighted.
He said: “In the very beginning, the government subsidised solar and wind, because the technologies were new and inevitably more expensive.
“Today those same forms are as cheap as any other form of energy but only because the government was prepared to invest.”
Mr Drakeford said he felt “enormous frustration” about not being able to reach an agreement for a similar strike price for marine energy, which ultimately dashed hopes for the tidal lagoon.
“It is a real inhibitor now to our ability to push on to the next stage of marine energy development in Pembrokeshire and north Wales as well,” he said.
“We put an enormous amount of money, European money, into developing those technologies.
“They are ready to produce electricity and it will be more expensive than you can buy elsewhere. Therefore, you need a subsidy regime until you get to a point where those technologies are commercially viable.”
Only then can Wales realise its ambition of generating all of its energy needs from entirely renewable resources, he said.
“In fact, we’ve already done it,” he said, referring to the brief period in 2019 when Wales was powered wholly by renewable sources.
“There were whole periods when Wales was entirely powered by renewable resources, and that is fantastic.”