L

Lord Spellar (Lab)

Speaking in the House of Lords on 6 May 2025

Debate

Energy Grid Resilience

Contribution

My Lords, the Statement says that the GB system is “highly resilient” but, in reality, has that not eroded over recent years, as was demonstrated recently at Heathrow, when we have known for some years about capacity problems in west London? The Minister will also be aware of the bottlenecks on the high-voltage national grid, not helped by the current long lead times—around four years—for high-voltage cable and transformers. Even without the rising threat of sabotage, has the network provider not been far too complacent about the threats to the resilience of our electricity network? Finally, he mentioned in a reply about small modular reactors that the industry has been waiting for too long for a decision while our competitors are moving rapidly ahead. Is it not now time for action to get on with building this industry of the future?

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