Lord Ravensdale (CB)

My Lords, I remind noble Lords of my interest as a chief engineer working for AtkinsRéalis. For my Amendment 7 in this group, I have simply retabled my amendment from Committee. As a brief reminder, we have targets in the SAF mandate —coming back to what noble Lord, Lord Moylan, said about power to liquid—and an escalating percentage of sustainable aviation fuel needs to be power to liquid. That is clearly set out in the SAF mandate. This amendment is trying to ensure coherence between the SAF mandate and the projects given support under the revenue certainty mechanism. This comes back to what the Minister set out about support for UK production. The percentages in the SAF mandate could simply be met by importing power to liquid fuel, so it is important that we set out the ambition for the industry to meet in producing all that fuel, which is already legally required under the SAF mandate, in the UK, aligning that with the earlier government amendments. I recognise that setting this out in the Bill may be going too far, but I would welcome the Minister’s comments on how this could be set out in the allocation framework documents to give industry that steer on power to liquid fuel and the expectations for producing it in the UK. My Amendments 14 and 16 are similar to those I tabled in Committee, and I thank the noble Lord, Lord Moylan, for signing them. I reflected on the Minister’s responses at that point, but I did not hear any compelling reasons why HEFA sustainable aviation fuel products should be included in the scope of the Bill. As the noble Lord, Lord Moylan, said, my amendment and his Amendment 15 are very similar and aim at the same thing. Mine deals more with the base product, using established definitions, and his encompasses the totality of HEFA products. I welcomed meetings with the Minister’s team of officials. The outcome was that the main rationale for retaining HEFA in the Bill is that that recognises that this is a fast-developing market and it is important to retain that flexibility in primary legislation. I accept that, but I still find it hard to imagine a scenario where the Government want to subsidise HEFA using the revenue certainty mechanism. The whole point of the legislation is to help pump-prime those new industries, not to support the well-established industries that we have to provide HEFA fuel. The Government are taking broader powers than they need under the legislation, so there is a risk that, as we go forward, subsidies could be given outside that intent. However, I hope that the Minister will be able to say something substantive about this in his remarks, on the exclusion of HEFA, and I look forward to hearing what he has to say in that regard.