UCL Energy Institute Directors welcome Global Apollo Programme

Following the announcement of the Global Apollo Programme, UCL-Energy Director Professor Bob Lowe and UCL-Energy Deputy Director Professor Neil Strachan said:

‘We very much welcome the call for greatly increased research and development spending on renewables, storage and smart grids.  Low carbon electricity is a key element of decarbonisation pathways.

However, there are broader considerations to achieving low carbon pathways, including:

- As a complement for new technology research and development funding in these priority areas, we to ensure that energy markets promote rapid growth of renewables, which are already competitive. Regulators must ensure that energy prices include the costing of the environmental harm caused by fosil fuel extraction and use, and must remove subsidies for further expansion.

- We need to also prioritise low carbon technologies, efficiencies and demand reductions in key end-use sectors, especially the built environment. Decarbonising the building stock is an essential element of any low carbon pathway given the scale of the challenge

- The system wide impacts – economic, environmental and societal – of low cost carbon technologies needs to be understood, and any potential cost, security and equity problems, identified and effectively managed

We will continue to watch the development of the Programme with great interest’.