Political Agenda: Scotland’s renewables ambition

Scotland is aiming high in its plans to rapidly decarbonise its whole energy system. But making the dream a reality wont be plain sailing, says David Blackman.

The new US president used to get extremely hot under the collar about windfarms in Scotland.

In a now infamous ­letter exchange, Donald Trump harangued the then Scottish first minister Alex Salmond about his government’s backing for a windfarm off the coast of a golf resort Trump had near Aberdeen.

Trump has bigger fish to fry now but he would probably take a dim view of the Scottish government’s new energy strategy, published on 24 January, which includes support for more of those pesky windfarms.

The strategy sets a target that 50 per cent of the country’s energy needs, including demand for heat and transport as well as power, will be generated from renewable sources by 2030. This is ambitious considering that despite impressive progress in recent years, renewables currently account for 13 per cent.

A key plank of the strategy is to convert two million Scottish homes to low-carbon energy by 2030. But there are few figures on how much it will cost to upgrade the ageing, leaky housing common in central Scotland.

Another problem, as the document acknowledges, is that much energy policy remains a reserved matter for the UK government.

The business department’s industrial strategy, which appeared in the same week, shows Westminster is still committed to curbing emissions. But the enthusiasm for renewables is much more palpable north of the border, where the government says it is “more important than ever” for Scotland to chart its own course. Perhaps we are seeing the first sketch of an energy strategy for an independent Scotland.