Mr. Jerry McEvilly:

On the energy security review, one of the main conclusions by the independent consultants is that they did not short-list a commercial liquefied natural gas, LNG, plant either onshore or floating. Neither did they short-list further offshore exploration. Broadly speaking, they rejected these options for two reasons. First, because of the risk of emissions lock-in, which I mentioned, given our climate obligations. The second reason was that there are major question marks as to what level of security they would actually bring. In the case of commercial LNG, the question is whether the tankers actually would arrive on time. In the case of exploration, members all know well the significant doubts and uncertainty around further offshore development. We would wholeheartedly agree with those two conclusions in the short-listing.

The energy security review independent analysis does short-list a State-backed floating LNG plant and the potential for gas storage. There are two points here. First, we would have major concerns around any form of LNG and not only because of that emissions lock-in risk. The consultants have raised the point that if it is State-backed, it could theoretically be used less and only used for emergency purposes. However, this does not get away from the risk of fracked gas imports. The most developed project in this case has been proposed by US developers. As I understand the majority of those exports come from fracked gas, it does not overcome that risk either. On gas storage, we could have a lengthy debate about the ins and outs of it and whether offshore or onshore is better but in a point that is broader than the development of fossil fuel infrastructure, it is crucial that where new infrastructure is planned domestically, it has to align in the first instance with climate obligation. It needs to be very clear how the fossil fuel supplies, in this case, will not lock in emissions. That analysis needs to be done in the first instance and if it was to be used temporarily - this is crucial - it would need to be absolutely clear that it could only be used with clear obligations, temporarily. Broadly speaking, the case for further fossil fuel infrastructure has not been clearly made in the analysis that is in that consultation paper. We would definitely be rejecting LNG for a wide variety of reasons.