As we lurch from banking crisis into economic recession, we desperately need some good news. This budget is good news for carbon reduction.
For business, we know that cash is tight right now and it is hard to finance an
investment in new energy efficient equipment like lighting, boilers and control systems.
The Government announcement today to provide the
Carbon Trust with an extra £165 million of
interest free loans to be made available to business and the public sector to expand existing
energy efficiency programmes is most welcome. This loan initiative makes perfect business sense as it will deliver low cost carbon savings and drive significant overall cost savings for the UK economy.
We already provide interest-free loans to
small businesses that they pay back through the savings they make. This scheme has huge scope to be extended to more organisations, creating a further 2,000 jobs in the first three years and
reducing energy bills for UK business by £500 million every year.
The additional £165 million of loans funding represents a four-fold increase in our current loans programme for the public and private sector. Overall it will cut £40 million from the UK's annual energy bill and deliver a quarter of a million tonnes of additional carbon dioxide savings a year.
We need innovative, often unproven, technologies and companies to flourish and make their case for focussed support. While US venture capital investment held up last year, European venture capital declined dramatically and we are in danger of losing out to the US in the long term.
We can make the UK a global hub for
low carbon innovation despite strong international competition. With limited
public funding we must invest in technology areas where we have real strengths and commit to support these over time.
Therefore, the decision on offshore wind to provide additional support is very welcome.
Offshore wind is a great example of a proven technology worthy of focussed support to drive down costs. The winds blow hard around the UK, we've got experience of offshore engineering from the North Sea and we can lead the world offshore generating tens of thousands of new jobs in the process.
Moving forward we will work with Government to ensure that the funding announced delivers maximum carbon impact and good overall value for money for Britain.