WITH REFERENCE TO Q476 ON HOW THE RESEARCH COUNCILS GO ABOUT ESTABLISHING POLICY IN THE RENEWABLES AREA

24 MARCH 2004

  BBSRC would like the Committee to note that it is taking the contribution of biological systems to renewable energy production very seriously and is planning a UK review of bioenergy research. This has, in part, been prompted by the publication of the Government's Energy White Paper, since BBSRC is keen to respond to the renewables challenge but is unsure at present how best to direct its limited funds within the broad area of bioenergy research—towards transport or electricity generation. The outcome of the BBSRC's planned review will hopefully point the Council in the right direction, and will be the key method of establishing a research policy for energy.

WITH REFERENCE TO Q487-490 ON RESEARCH COUNCIL FUNDING OF ENERGY RESEARCH

BBSRC

  BBSRC's current research in bioenergy is confined to the responsive mode. The portfolio in this area is dominated by fundamental research into plant light-harvesting complexes and the development of biomass crops for transport fuels and/or combustion/pyrolysis for electricity generation. Another relevant area in which the UK community is very small and fragmented is biological hydrogen production from microbes. In addition, BBSRC has recently launched a new priority area for bioenergy research within the responsive mode through the Plant and Microbial Sciences Committee. This has a distinct focus under the title "Fossil Carbon Substitution: Biomass and Biosynthesis". BBSRC has now received its first research proposals under this new priority area.

  BBSRC is also playing an active role in the management of the NERC-led Towards a Sustainable Energy Economy Programme and will be looking at ways in which it might support proposals relevant to its remit which are received in response to the Programme's calls-for-proposals.

EPSRC

  The following figures, which are for the year 2003-04, exclude £15.6 million of ring-fenced expenditure on the UK fusion programme, supporting the Culham Laboratory.

Funding Mode	Managed	Responsive	Total	PercentManaged	PercentResponsive
Biofuels	£23,957	£110,971	£134,929	17.8%	82.2%
Biomass	£895,366	£54,143	£949,509	94.3%	5.7%
CHP	£186,585	£39,319	£225,905	82.6%	17.4%
CO2 Sequestration	£0	£30,323	£30,323	0.0%	100.0%
Conventional Generation	£568,221	£249,361	£817,582	69.5%	30.5%
Energy Efficiency	£571,701	£594,649	£1,166,350	49.0%	51.0%
Fuel Cells	£618,709	£502,562	£1,121,271	55.2%	44.8%
Wave & Tidal Power	£442,603	£363,623	£806,226	54.9%	45.1%
Funding Mode	Managed	Responsive	Total	PercentManaged	PercentResponsive
Hydrogen	£1,379,795	£114,361	£1,494,155	92.3%	7.7%
Networks	£938,204	£811,264	£1,749,469	53.6%	46.4%
Nuclear	£151,589	£60,651	£212,239	71.4%	28.6%
Photovolatics	£974,422	£1,369,249	£2,343,670	41.6%	58.4%
Energy Storage	£385,256	£342,876	£728,132	52.9%	47.1%
Energy from Waste	£0	£169,024	£169,024	0.0%	100.0%
Wind	£274,786	£187,384	£462,170	59.5%	40.5%
Total	£7,411,194	£4,999,759	£12,410,954	59.7%	40.3%

ESRC

  Most of ESRC's energy-related research funding falls into the directed-mode category. Although some of its energy research, for example on energy regulation, is not focused specifically on renewables, a substantial proportion of its research under the Sustainable Technologies Programme is, eg research on wind-farm planning. ESRC provides over 15 per cent of the funding for the Tyndall Centre, amounting to about £250k pa—and this is allocated in responsive mode. The table summarises recent, current and committed/contracted ESRC expenditure on energy-related research.

Research Area	Contracted/Committed Expenditure (£k)
	2000-01	2001-02	2002-03	2003-04	2004-05	2005-06
Sustainable TechnologiesProgramme
Phase I
Wind energy—planning process			18	50	50	30
Diffusion of alternative technologies (wind energy and eco-housing, two of three case studies examined)			15	55	55	15
Fuel cells—innovation, adoption and use			40	75	75	40
Low carbon technologies innovation policy (electricity generation, one of two case study areas)			50	105	55
Household energy consumption (domestic appliances)			13	48	56
Oil and gas—measuring sustainability (ESRC contribution to link project)			5	10	5
Phase IIRegulation, markets and development of renewable energy technologies (fellowship)				30	55	35
Integrating micro-generation in networks and buildings				30	100	70
Innovation systems in renewables				25	75	45
Community energy initiatives				20	70	50
Research Area	Contracted/Committed Expenditure (£k)
	2000-01	2001-02	2002-03	2003-04	2004-05	2005-06
Environment and Human Behaviour Programme
Wind energy—public attitudes				40
Indoor urban environments and energy consumption				40
Climate change and fuel poverty				25	20
Other ResearchEnvironmental policy instruments (energy production one of four policy sectors studied) (Part of ESRC's Future Governance Programme—comparative public policy)	25	25	25
Regulation of energy companies—(impact on prices and consumers) (ROPA award)		28	82	46
Household behaviour (energy saving one of four areas being studied) (Responsive mode)		20	40	50
Opportunities and barriers to uptake of green energy Initiatives (CSERGE)			20	15
TOTAL	25	73	308	664	616	285

  The above does not include work of more general relevance to energy conducted at ESRC Centres such as the Centre for Social and Economic Research on the Global Environment (CSERGE) and Centre for Business Relationships, Accountability, Sustainability and Society (BRASS). It also excludes funding for research-related activities such as the ESRC Energy Conference in March 2003 and the review of energy research and consultation on future priorities conducted earlier this year.

  It further excludes funding provided for the Towards a Sustainable Energy Economy Programme through the 2002 Spending Review, and ESRC's contribution to the Tyndall Centre (currently £250k pa) and planned contribution to the Carbon Vision Initiative (£500k over five years).

Research Area	Planned Expenditure (£k)
	2003-04	2004-05	2005-06	2006-07	2007-08
Towards a Sustainable Energy Economy Programme (ESRC)		600	3,250	4,300	4,550
Carbon Vision (contribution to EPSRC/Carbon Trust Initiative)		100	100	100	100
24 MARCH 2004

  The ESRC SR2002 allocation for TSEC has been provisionally rescheduled in the above table over a number of years to account for anticipated likely resource expenditure, and figures are subject to SR2004 outcomes. The above may also be supplemented by responsive-mode support but this cannot be predicted at this stage.

NERC

  The Committee is referred to Table 1 of Annex 5 of the RCUK written evidence to the inquiry, which is reproduced here.

  1  Science Budget investment has been calculated based on expenditure under mode 1 (Strategic Data and Knowledge, including core staff) and mode 5 (Research, direct marginal costs of Research Programmes) of the NERC funding framework.

  2  Financial information on investment in research grants at Higher Education Institutes are based on a search of NERC's MANTRA database using the following key words: Wind, wave, hot rock, hydro-electric, hot dry rock, geothermal, wave energy, solar, tidal, tides, biofuel, energy, biomass, sustain, renewable, fuel, nuclear, radioact*, sequestration, CHP, aquifer heat, hydrogen, photovoltaic.

  3  Planned expenditure.

  4  This is estimated spend only on research relevant to hydro and bio sources and their sustainability. CEH is in the process of establishing its new research programmes and will initiate a full review of energy related work undertaken by CEH.

  5  British Geological Survey: Sustainable energy and geophysical surveys. This programme researched CO2 capture, transport and underground storage, and Ground Source Heat Pumps.

  6  Proudman Oceanographic Laboratory: Offshore wave modelling and nearshore wave measuring (wind, wave and tidal). This research could underpin offshore wave power studies and may be used in commissioned research concerning wave power. 2003-04 to 2004-05 figures includes 45K part HF radar capital (Ocean Surface Current Radar Facility). Note: 2002-03 submission includes staff salary element (excluded for subsequent years).

  7  Southampton Oceanography Centre: Wave climate research in the North Atlantic and British shelf seas is valuable for assessing the "available resource" for wave energy and some of the risks for all offshore installations (including wave and offshore wind).

  8  This denotes NERC's contribution to the Tyndall Centre for Climate Change (NERC provides 50 per cent of the Research Councils' funding. EPSRC provide a 35 per cent and ESRC provide 15 per cent).

  9  "Blue skies" research includes underpinning research into solar, wind, wave and tidal energy.

  The expenditure given in the table can be categorised as directed- or responsive-mode expenditure as follows: the expenditure in the first five rows is essentially in directed mode, whereas that in the next two (Tyndall Centre and "Blue skies") is in responsive mode. This means, for example, that in 2004-05, NERC expenditure is planned to be:

  Total:  £2,828,000

  Directed:  £2,175,000 (77 per cent)

  Responsive:  £653,000 (23 per cent)

  The footnotes to the table indicate the technological areas covered. The Tyndall Centre's research is relevant to energy and renewables in that it looks at how energy generation and use are affecting our climate and at options for reducing atmospheric concentrations of greenhouse gases by using low-carbon technologies.

Comparison with funding in other countries

  A comparison with basic energy research funding in other countries, such as the USA, is complicated by the split of research between different agencies. For example, the US Department of Energy funds a series of national laboratories, such as the National Renewable Energy laboratory in Golden, Colorado, through the Office of Basic Energy Science (BES). The BES President's request for laboratory funding for the financial year 2003 was $231.9 million. The US National Nanotechnology Initiative, with a proposed budget of $1 billion in 2005, is a programme which includes support for energy research across many agencies, including the National Science Foundation (the US equivalent of the UK Research Councils).