Energy Policy - Jersey Energy Trust - Transcript - 21 May 2013

Environment Scrutiny Panel

Energy Policy Review with the Jersey Energy Trust

TUESDAY, 21st MAY 2013

Panel:

Deputy J.H. Young of St. Brelade (Chairman) Deputy S.G. Luce of St. Martin (Vice-Chairman) Connétable P.J. Rondel of St. John

Witness:

Sir Nigel Broomfield, Chairman, Jersey Energy Trust

Also present:

Mr. R. Levett (Panel Adviser)

[14:01]

Deputy J.H. Young of St. Brelade (Chairman):

So let me welcome Sir Nigel and everybody to this afternoon's session of the Environment Scrutiny Panel where this afternoon's hearing continues, the second of our evidence sessions examining or inquiring into the draft energy plan for Jersey produced by the Minister for Planning and Environment, Pathway 2050. I will start by introducing myself. If we could all introduce ourselves for the record. Deputy John Young, Chairman of the Environment Scrutiny Panel.

Thank you very much. Well, I am sure, Sir Nigel, you have seen a little notice in front of you, so that explains that your presence here is covered by those rules, which gives you those protections. What we are going to try and do, if you have got the schedule, we are going to try and ... we had scheduled originally an hour for you, which we had reserved for you and Andrea Cook in connection with the Jersey Energy Trust. Unfortunately we are in the ... I do not know if you have had this message that Andrea Cook is not able to be with us today.

Chairman, Jersey Energy Trust:

I talked to her last night. Mr. Chairman, I will just pass on, she has spoken to the Scrutiny Officer and given her great regrets. She will be here in the Island for a Jersey Energy Trust meeting in July. If any of the members of the panel were available, yourself, I strongly recommend you talk to her. She was a member of the Energy Trust in the U.K. (United Kingdom), is an expert in this area, has been an expert on our board and has a great deal of knowledge in this area. So if you come to any conclusions and you want to test them with somebody who has wider experience in the U.K. then I commend Andrea to you very much. She would make herself available to meet any of you if you wanted to do that.

Deputy J.H. Young:

Okay, well thank you very much. In terms of this afternoon, so if we can aim to ... I think provisionally an hour and then depending on how we go, if we could then spend another half an hour after that on the Renewable Energy Commission. What I may do is just move on to the Renewable Energy subject faster if we can. So I am sorry it is a little bit flexible, but we are trying to do 2 things at once. So let us begin by talking about the Energy Trust. Thank you for the reports that you have provided us with, Sir Nigel. We have

had the ones up until 2011, and do I take it that there are new ones that have been circulating?

Chairman, Jersey Energy Trust: No, those are just copies of those.

Deputy J.H. Young:

Just copies. So we have had the report 2011. I think we have had an opportunity to look through them briefly, I just wondered if you could perhaps sum up what, you know, the achievements of the Trust since it was formed, for us? Not in any detail, just where do you think ... what has been achieved and what point have we got to, if you would, please?

Chairman, Jersey Energy Trust:

Thank you very much. The 2012 report is in preparation and it should be concluded, I think, early next month or the month after and we will send it to you as soon as it is. It is just the next year after that one that you have got there. So it will give you the up-to-date picture. I think, Jersey Energy Trust was set up in 2009, Freddie Cohen asked Andrea to start chairing it and then I took over from her in 2009, towards the end. We were given very clear directions as to what we were trying to do and they are set out in our terms of reference and the objectives were quite carefully crafted by Freddie and the Environment Director of the day in the Planning and Environment Department. There are some quite clear targets, deliver at least 15 per cent reduction in energy usage, achieve household energy savings targets of £70 to £250. They are set out in the executive summary and the Energy Efficiency Statistics that you have and that is what we were told to aim at by Freddie; us doing that. We set to work and we did that. You will see that we have met those targets consistently since we have been in operation. The scope of our activities was quite restricted in that for the first phase at least,

we were asked to concentrate on, what I would call the vulnerable sector in the Island. That is to say, pensioners and those people who clearly did not have the resources to put into their houses or apartments or where they were living, energy saving measures, and did not have, frankly, either the confidence probably to go out into the market and do something about it themselves so we ran a turnkey operation through the E.E.S. (Energy Efficiency Service), the Director for Environmental Policy and her team, which went to people who qualified, they were on the various schemes which the Island run, Westfield 65 and so on, and asked them, saw them and they said: "Yes, we would like to have some insulation and help" and we took it from there all the way through. That is to say, we talked to them, we had the apartments or houses looked at, we engaged the contractors, we laid down the guidelines for the contractors to operate and we came back and checked to see that it was done. So those people got, in a sense, a Rolls Royce service, but they needed it because otherwise frankly they would not have done it. A lot of them were elderly, a lot of them were worried about letting people in their houses and so forth and we took a lot of care about that. Therefore, in a sense, it was time inefficient, but it was time well spent because they then took them up and you can see from the literature essentially, needless to say, we quoted the flattering, at least complimentary, comments about us so the people were very happy. It soon became clear for all concerned it was a win all the way round. They lived in warmer apartments, they lived healthier lives in the winter, they saved money, they spent more money on other things which help the Island economy, we engage the people who are doing the work, we brought them up to scratch and made sure that they were competent. There are now 3 cavity wall machines in the Island when there was only one before, there are more people doing this sort of thing than there were before. So, in terms of that, the employment side and the quality control side was operated by the Director for Environmental Policy under guidance from the Jersey Energy

Trust and, I have to say, although it is not intended to be self-satisfied or flattering, I believe that those programmes have been extremely successful and have achieved their aims. But they are restricted only to the people who are on the, I would not call them the vulnerable list, but anyway, those who are drawing benefits from the States.

Deputy J.H. Young:

Is that a job that is now done, Sir Nigel?

Chairman, Jersey Energy Trust:

No, there are still more. You can see from the statistics there are still houses which we have not reached. Either they do not want to do it or they are worried about allowing people into their houses or something. There is a body of people who we can do and we stretched it out into places where ... we now do institutions, that is to say charitable institutions which look after a lot of people, where old people stay and you can see them listed in those documents that we have given you. We have moved into other areas of what I would call vulnerability so it is not just the individuals, we have gone into the major charities and they are listed there. So, we have consistently sort of widened the scope a bit in order to achieve both the volume that I think is a good thing, and also a general reputation among people who talk to each other that: "Gosh, it is quite good, it is worth doing."

Deputy J.H. Young:

Right, so should that carry on?

Chairman, Jersey Energy Trust:

Yes, I think, should carry on. At the beginning of this year we sat in the Trust and looked at what we were going to do this year and our hope had been that the Island Energy Plan would be taken through the States quite early in the spring and therefore it would be signed off and as you see from - the Director for Environmental Policy tells me she has given you the documents - that then would allow us to go into what I would call the able-to-pay sector. That is the 19,000 to 20,000 houses which are lived in by people who are not dependent on the States for subsidies or benefits or anything of that sort, but which definitely need, because quite a lot of them are very energy inefficient, definitely need to have these programmes put in with them. We were looking then, and we can come to those if you would like to, we are preparing for a number of programmes which we believe that we would be able to roll out and hopefully attract attention. We have done some of them already in order to familiarise the Island; we did a thermal imaging exercise. I do not know whether you saw your house on it and I do not know whether it was green or yellow or red, but that is one of the things that we did and we sent it round the Parishes. It achieved the effect I hoped, which is, people being people, you are always nosey about your neighbour and it is quite fun to see if they are yellow and you are green and you are better than them.

Deputy J.H. Young:

Is that the basis of your future plans, that you would be selective about the work that you do on the able-to-pay sector based on that work?

Chairman, Jersey Energy Trust:

Not necessarily. I think that that will probably incline people who see that they have a very inefficient house and understand that with a little expenditure they can get a very good return on their investment.

Deputy J.H. Young:

But how would you go about selecting?

Chairman, Jersey Energy Trust:

Selecting those would be done partly by initially, it is one of the other tools that we worked out, is an inspection report and we are considering whether we should pay ... an inspection of a house costs about £120. We would consider paying that; we, the Energy Trust, with our income of about roughly £1 million a year from the Vehicle Emissions Duty - another £1m from this Duty goes to the technical transport people. So we get a million, roughly a million and you can see the figures in the papers there. We would use some of that money to say: "All right, we will pay half an inspection, for example". So you get an inspection, a qualified inspector comes to your house, he goes over it, he looks at everything from light bulbs through to insulation and says: "Here is the menu of things that you could do and this is what the cost would be and this is what the savings would be." So it is rather like getting a menu, you get an à la carte menu, and we would hope to influence people because we are talking to them to go and do some of these things on the grounds that if they do, they will certainly get their money back and quite quickly.

Deputy J.H. Young:

And who would pay for that work?

Chairman, Jersey Energy Trust: They would pay for it.

Deputy J.H. Young:

So what you are saying is the role of the trust, your proposal or your intention would be is that you subsidise the survey work but then by persuasion bring about the work, persuade people to do the work on their homes?

Chairman, Jersey Energy Trust:

I would hope that what I would call enlightened self-interest would take over. But that is one area that we would look at.

Deputy J.H. Young:

But can I just check? Would people then have to come forward and say: "I want to be surveyed", or are you intending to follow up this idea of health who want to have inspectors in their proposals to go and visit peoples' homes?

[14:15]

Chairman, Jersey Energy Trust:

Yes, we would advertise it. We would say: "Here is an offer, if you wish to have a more fuel-efficient house and save yourself some money, take, not a free inspection, but a half free inspection and look at what you could do and it is up to you when you do it. You can do it in one go, you can do it in many steps, but this is something which you are getting a really valuable piece of advice for which, if you follow it ...", obviously people are not able always to follow advice because they have lots of other rather pressing calls on their budget, but they will then know that if they have some spare money or if they are prepared or able to invest, this is a good investment because it will return itself pretty quickly to you. But that is one scheme.

Deputy J.H. Young:

Could I just, I think Constable Phil wants to come in there.

The Connétable of St. John :

All that is subject to the States adopting this plan?

Chairman, Jersey Energy Trust:

Yes, indeed. Well, perhaps I should put it into the context. The plan has been in gestation, it is roughly twice as old as an elephant's baby, it has been around for a long time. We started looking at the plan, the Director for Environmental Policy, with a bit of help from me, in about 2008 or 2009, was it? Yes, so it has been up the hill, it got to the top of the hill, it got stuck back down again because another election came and it fell away, now it has come back up the hill again and this time we really hope it will come over the hill because it is necessary and I think it is very important and it is a very big benefit both to the Island, the environment and the economic sector.

The Connétable of St. John  

Do you think there is sufficient detail in here to take it to the States, basically even if this was updated to 2013? Do you think there is sufficient for my colleagues in the House to adopt it in its current format?

Chairman, Jersey Energy Trust:

I do indeed. I would urge them very strongly to adopt it. The plan is not a set of absolute policies because over the timeframe between now and 2050, you could not do that. What it is saying is we will take the first 5 years, we will look at the steps that would be possible to take. It does not envisage, at the moment, a big injection of funds, it would still go on running on the Vehicle Emissions Tax, it is not stuff that is coming out of peoples' pockets through normal taxation, it is from people who are driving large motorcars around, are paying for it at the moment. So it is, in a sense, a very economic investment from the States point of view. What it does do is set a series of objectives and says: "This is the sort of thing we should be doing", and it says ... you see this as the Minister for Planning and Environment will bring forward or the Minister for Housing will bring forward or the Minister for Transport and Technical Services will bring forward, so it says to them: "This is an interdepartmental across the board operation. All of you have to contribute", and the States, the Government of Jersey as the employer of over 6,000

people and a user of a great many motorcars and houses and buildings all around the place, equally has a large exemplary role to play, in my view.

Deputy J.H. Young:

I wonder if we should perhaps pause at that point. I think the Constable's question was trying to tease out to what extent would these plans that you have outlined go ahead anyway? Or to what extent they were dependent upon a political approval being given. I mean, maybe I will phrase it, you have obviously planned for the changes as you have just explained, because they are very clearly worked up. Does your Trust get directions from the Minister for Planning and Environment on the scope of the scheme? Has he given such instructions?

Chairman, Jersey Energy Trust:

No, he has not. At the moment we are operating on the terms of reference that we were given by Freddie Cohen, they have not changed to take account of Robert Duhamel coming in to the office. Those original terms of reference envisaged that the Trust would become, as it were, a standalone body absorbing 2 or 3 people from the E.E.S. and, as it were, would run as an agency obviously ...

Deputy J.H. Young: Has that happened?

Chairman, Jersey Energy Trust: No, it has not. No.

Deputy J.H. Young:

So at the moment, can I just check? Are you a proper Trust as it were; has the Trust been formed?

Yes, the Trust is in existence.

Deputy J.H. Young:

There is a Trust instrument, there's a Trust body?

Chairman, Jersey Energy Trust:

It is in existence. It was assumed that there would be phase 1 and phase 2. Phase 1 we got very clear guidance on. Phase 2, I will just read you a couple of sentences which says what the original idea was and it says: "Phase 2, the Jersey Energy Trust from 2010 onwards will inter alia ..." Well it did not do that and did a whole lot of things and it was thought that we would, as it were, take on the E.E.S. into this body and then operate at arm's length, but reporting to the Minister obviously under political control, but in a more independent way. It says here: "The Jersey Energy Trust shall oversee [this is phase 1] and guide the operation and energy producers. In future phases of the scheme, it is likely that the Energy Efficiency Service will become an integral part of the Jersey Energy Trust."

Deputy J.H. Young:

Right, if I can stop you there.

Chairman, Jersey Energy Trust:

"Working as part of a body responsible for the outreach and delivery of programmes."

Deputy J.H. Young:

Right, so at the moment we have got stage one, you have been working on, you have those terms of reference.

Yes.

Deputy J.H. Young:

Reporting to the Minister, we are at the point where you would need instructions, from what you said, from the Minister to move to phase 2. But if you were to get those instructions that would ...

Chairman, Jersey Energy Trust:

It is obviously your business as to how the States deal with this, whether you wish to have it laid before the House, debated and approved by the House, all that sort of stuff. But until you do that, I have no clearance, the Trust has no clearance to go beyond phase 1.  

Deputy J.H. Young:

Thank you for that, thank you for clearing that up. Now, I think, when you were explaining your plans for the future, which was about encouraging people by persuasion to go ahead and do all this work, I wanted to challenge you as to what extent you thought that would deliver the results. I did not hear any mechanism or financial pressures on people. They are going to get a free subsidy, they are going to get a check and then it is entirely up to them as to whether they decide to do it or not.

Chairman, Jersey Energy Trust:

I personally think that we should have a rotating fund, that is to say, a fund, and we can discuss ... I can only give my personal views because we were working it up in the Trust and I cannot say that there is an official view from the Trust on this, but there is a thing called the Green Deal in the U.K. in which the Government puts a pot of money together and says to people:

"You can borrow from that pot of money and the savings that you will make, i.e. let us say that you have put in solar PV or something, you will get £250, £300 a year saving, so you will pay that back, so the savings that you get initially will be used to pay back the principal of the loan and when you have done that you will then have the benefit of, let us say, 14 to 15, 20 years of, as it were, very much cheaper energy. So, you borrow the money, you pay it back out of the savings you have made, the money then goes back in the pot. Somebody else gets it." Now, Roger will tell you that it has not been an unqualified success because there are a number of problems with it. One of them, for example, is that if you take out a Green Deal loan on your house, how do you sell it? Do you sell it with a mortgage and the Green Deal loan? Will people buy it? Do they want to commit? Does the next person buying that house want to take on that loan from you? It has turned out to be a bit of an inhibitor, and Roger will correct me if I am wrong, but quite a lot of people on-selling their houses pay off, use some of the sale of the house to pay off the Green Deal loan and just get rid of it. So it is not around anymore and therefore it is not actually achieving it. I, personally, believe that in the circumstances in Jersey, we would be better advised to look at something on the following lines, and please do not take this as formal proposal, it is just an idea, there are many ways of doing it. You go to the banks, you say to them: "Okay guys, put together £5 million to £10 million." I would go to your respected Minister for Treasury and Resources and say to him: "You play the role of the European Central Bank, you guarantee those loans." That means that the interest rate on those loans would be much, much lower than they would be if they were borrowing at market price. So the States take on the contingent liability for that loan, and it would be quite unusual for it to be triggered, i.e. that somebody collapsed and did not pay it back, but it would be a contingent liability. The banks do what they do best, which is to lend money and make sure that they are paid back, and therefore you get a straight loan going through at a subsidised rate, the money goes round the

pot again and it is topped up continuously as people pay it back. The banks get contact with people who are likely to have good accounts so they get a benefit from that. The recipients of the loan get competition from the banks because they will be competing for these clients. The rate of interest will probably be the same, but the service they offer will be different from each bank. So, something like that might be an alternative. But I think that when I was saying the other day, there is this inspection thing, that is just one bit of it. There are lots of other things that can be done which can, as it were, accelerate and incentivise people in a much more material way to take this on.

Deputy J.H. Young:

The work that you are talking about doing there, would it be your intention that the inspectors and others would be employed by the Trust?

Chairman, Jersey Energy Trust:

The inspectors for the home inspections?

Deputy J.H. Young: Yes.

Chairman, Jersey Energy Trust:

No, they would be employed by the householders but they would be on a list that we would supply, people that we dealt with.

Deputy J.H. Young:

Right. So you just subsidise them?

Chairman, Jersey Energy Trust:

So they would get a benefit... we subsidise the householder but then the people doing the inspecting will get £120, they will get £60 from the person and £60 from ...

Deputy J.H. Young:

But is there the capacity in the local contractors to be able to do all ... to meet the demand there?

Chairman, Jersey Energy Trust:

Well, if I could just sort of step back a bit and say there are really 3 different sorts of interests here. There is an environment interest, there is an economic commercial interest and there is a public interest. We, in the Jersey Trust do the environment interest; we are meeting the targets for saving carbon and all that. But, I, as the Chairman, and with the Director for Environmental Policy, in the E.E.S., we think carefully also about the economic and the commercial interests, that is to say employment, and you will see from the figures that more people are now employed doing this sort of work. The skills have gone up, so that is good for the economy. Then there is the public interest in 2 steps. One interest is obviously the recipients of the services, is it good for them? Are they getting a good service? Are they benefiting from it, fuel poverty and all that? And there is a public interest in the sense of the housing stock in the Island being upgraded and being improved. So, it is a balance between those 3 interests that you have to strike. It is not entirely our job to do that, but those are the 3 considerations I have in mind, and that has been to some extent a rather restricted view because we only deal with the people who are on benefits, but when we move into the able-to-pay, we will be balancing those interests and trying to encourage all 3. The best thing about this is that all 3 interests are compatible.

What you have covered very comprehensively, I think, is the Trust's views about what needs to be done in the future of existing buildings, I think.

Have you a view on non-new buildings on what our standards ought to be? Have you had any input into the building bylaw setting processes at all?

Chairman, Jersey Energy Trust:

The hesitation is not because I am trying to conceal anything. There are a number of bodies. I was Chairman of a thing called A.G.E.S. (Advisory Group on Environmental Security) which is appropriate, I guess. It was the Advisory Group on Environmental Security which is now defunct, it is stopped. In the A.G.E.S. we looked at  B.R.E.E.A.M. (Building Research Establishment Environmental Assessment Method) building standards, and we were saying to Dandara and others: "You have got to build new build either carbon neutral or very, very efficient B.R.E.E.A.M. Mark 2" and we made our pitch there. In a sense as being responsible for the built environment, which is what the Jersey Energy Trust does, it is not with transport or anything like that, that is very much our view that those standards should be applied and my understanding is, and the Director for Environmental Policy may correct me, is that the Minister for Planning and Environment has taken that on board. There is still some argument about whether you promulgate regulations to make it obligatory to do that, but those arguments are well understood and well lodged in the planning department.

Deputy J.H. Young:

You have mentioned another group that you were on that is no more. Can you just repeat that for us again?

Chairman, Jersey Energy Trust:

Look at me and see how old I am. It is called A.G.E.S.

Deputy J.H. Young:

And this was a group set up by the Minister for Planning and Environment as well, was it?

Chairman, Jersey Energy Trust:

It was set up by Freddie Cohen at the time and the Chief Minister, Frank Walker , used to come along and we would talk to him about it all. Essentially, we looked at the whole lot, we looked at transport, we looked at a whole ... across the board, I mean, it was much wider ranging than the Jersey Energy Trust and that now has ceased to operate because the people on it were busy folk. I mean we had commercial and other folk on it and maybe they thought that some of their views were not being put into effect.

[14:30]

It does not operate, but in the course of those discussions, we did look at, and in great detail, and one or 2 of our members talked to Dandara and others and said: "Okay guys, put up some show houses, show us what you can do."

Deputy J.H. Young:

So that group were pushing for B.R.E.E.A.M. 2 which is now what you would think is useful.

Chairman, Jersey Energy Trust: Yes, absolutely.

Deputy J.H. Young:

Before you leave the issue of that group, that group had a wider remit across the energy policy generally, did it?

Chairman, Jersey Energy Trust:

It had wider remit across the environment policy, across the whole of the environment...

Deputy J.H. Young:

Did it touch, for example, economic issue about energy regulation and tariffs and so on? Does it deal with that?

Chairman, Jersey Energy Trust:

No, that would be in the Jersey Energy Trust.

Deputy J.H. Young:

I see, it is in your area too, is it?

Chairman, Jersey Energy Trust:

Yes, I mean we have not given detailed opinions on the tariffs and so forth because really that is a matter for regulation between the Minister for Planning and Environment and his colleagues in the ministerial team and the Jersey Energy Company. The head of the Jersey Energy Company happens to sit on the Jersey Energy Trust, Chris Ambler is a member of it, and so we have discussions to which he is privy and we discuss all this, but those decisions, I think, will be ministerial with the Minister for Finance and the Minister for Planning and Environment and also some other people who are interested in the budgetary issues there.

Deputy J.H. Young:

Thank you for that. Can I just check, now you see, you mentioned that the head of the J.E.C. (Jersey Electric Company) is on the Trust. Can you just for the record tell us who the other members are please?

Chairman, Jersey Energy Trust:

Yes, the members are Andrea Cook, who is based in Newcastle. She was a member of the Energy Trust in the U.K., the body which does the energy work. Roger knows them very well.

Panel Adviser:

The Energy Saving Trust.

Chairman, Jersey Energy Trust:

Energy Saving Trust; that is it. Chris Ambler who is the Chief Executive of Jersey Energy; David Lord who represents, as it were, the charitable N.G.O.s (non-government organisations) and he is the head of the Leonard Cheshire home in Rope Walk; Peter Cadiou who is an expert. Which bit would you put him in? Jersey Energy? Yes, we had him on early on to say that we wanted, as it were, either a poacher or a gamekeeper, whichever you see J.E.C. as. We wanted one of them inside, working for us. So he is an expert from inside the J.E.C. He does a lot of number crunching for us and so forth. That is our quorum. We should be one more, and we are probably going to appoint ... if this is on the record, I will stop there, but we are going to appoint somebody who ...

Deputy J.H. Young:

You mean, a replacement? You have got another ...

Chairman, Jersey Energy Trust:

Well, we may want to add on somebody who is experienced in this field.

Deputy J.H. Young:

Okay, do not name if it is not clear.

Chairman, Jersey Energy Trust:

They were head of the Huntingdon .... he was a chief planning officer and a chief housing officer for Huntingdonshire and he has now come back to the Island. He has done a lot of this stuff in Huntingdonshire and knows a great deal about the built environment and those policies and he might if all agree come on and help us out. Maybe one other: we would like a businessman probably to give us, who worked for the Chamber or somewhere, a view from business.

Deputy J.H. Young:

Can I just check this? The appointments are made by the Minister. Have they all been renewed? Do you know?

Chairman, Jersey Energy Trust:

The appointments are approved by the Minister on submission from the Chairman of the Jersey Energy Trust.

Deputy J.H. Young:

All right. Have they all been renewed because they usually ...

Chairman, Jersey Energy Trust:

They are all in office. There is a slight hiatus in the sense that it was intended that people would come on for 3 or 4 years and then either be reappointed or be replaced. One or 2 of the earlier people have got to the 3 or 4-year mark and I have extended them until we get the plans through and we then understand from the Minister what it is he now wants the Jersey Energy Trust to do.

Deputy J.H. Young:

Okay, so at the moment, you are waiting for adoption of the plan, the new mandate for the Trust and the extended work programme that you have explained to us? Perhaps I can hand over to my colleagues to see if they want to ...

The Connétable of St. John :

Is the position remunerated or is it an honorarium or not?

Chairman, Jersey Energy Trust:

No, it is all voluntary. One member lives in the UK and has expenses paid.[1] But the rest of us are voluntary.

The Deputy of St. Martin :

Sir Nigel, you mentioned your thermal imagery map. Can I ask how that is physically done? Was it done from satellite or was it done locally? How was that work undertaken?

Chairman, Jersey Energy Trust:

Again, we hired a company from the U.K. They flew in strips across the Island in an aeroplane with a thermal imaging camera at night and then you get a sort of band which goes up and down and chops the Island up and it shows all the houses and it reflects really the heat loss from those houses. Either it is a big heat loss in which case they are red, or it is a pretty minor heat loss in which case they are green, or if it is in between, it is yellow. Or if

you happen to be in your garden hut, which I find a surprising number of people in Jersey were, not telling their wives what they were up to, they turn out to be red. I suspect there was quite a lot of internal domestic argument as to what was going on down there. But anyway, that is what we did.

The Deputy of St. Martin :

You are happy that that work was accurate and the map reflects exactly what is going on underneath those roofs?

Chairman, Jersey Energy Trust:

Yes, they have a lot of experience; they have done it elsewhere. It was a professional job done by a company that does that. It does not tell you any more than what the state of play was on that night. If somebody puts some more insulation in their loft the day after then obviously they are going to be different readings... but the idea of it was to say to people: "Look, you are throwing money in the air. Why do you not just keep it in your house?"

The Deputy of St. Martin :

Okay. Changing the subject to your summary here, I see in the summary you say that to date, and I know that this is to January 2011, there were 735 private homes that were helped. Was that number reciprocated in the following 2 years? I mean, since January 2011, how many homes have we assisted roughly? I mean, is it something which is sort of ongoing at the same sort of rate?

Chairman, Jersey Energy Trust:

It is. I am going to refer to the Director for Environmental Policy as I always do, or defer to the Director. Anyway, yes we carried on and that is what we have done. We started in 2009. By 2011, we had done that number and we have done another lot of houses. Because it is going through a report stage now for 2012 and the numbers are being crunched, I would not want to mislead you unless you want to get an indication. But, right. Are those additional or are those the total? Okay. The Director for Environmental Policy says that it is between 1,200 and 1,300 homes now.

The Deputy of St. Martin :

So it is carrying on pretty much so far.

Chairman, Jersey Energy Trust:

It has got another 400 on top of the ones that you have got there.

The Deputy of St. Martin :

I see from the stats that you provided here that the payback on the savings is made over 4 to 5 years?

Chairman, Jersey Energy Trust: Yes, 4 to 5....

The Deputy of St. Martin :

The savings pay back the original cost?

Chairman, Jersey Energy Trust: Yes.

The Deputy of St. Martin :

Is that a sort of ratio that you would expect to be ongoing or do you expect to sort of suffer from the further you go, the more difficult it is going to be to create smaller savings?

Chairman, Jersey Energy Trust:

No, I think that those are typical savings. If you read the longer report, you see that there are some caveats at the end of it about what exactly you are measuring and whether it is comparable, one with another and all that. There is a lot of individuality in people's houses and so forth so you have to take a broad view of it. For the measures which you are looking at, which are basically those of insulation, because the Energy Saving Trust in the U.K. and ourselves have come to the conclusion that the biggest heat loss is through your buildings. They are very inefficient. I have to say, I am afraid, that that is across the board in Jersey from both the States side as well as the private side. So I would expect to find those sorts of savings running on.

The Deputy of St. Martin :

To be clear, the saving is made, you calculate the saving to be made on the number of units of energy that have been used; not the carbon emissions?

Chairman, Jersey Energy Trust:

That is the saving to the person involved. I mean, that is what comes up on your meter, as it were.

The Deputy of St. Martin :

Yes. That is right. So, you would calculate the number of units of energy used in the previous year and the year following and look at the 2?

Chairman, Jersey Energy Trust:

Yes, and you would look at the 2. I am interested in the saving carbon-wise, because that is what I have been asked to look at. The person in the house is obviously looking at the saving cash-wise which is what incentivises them to do it. In those instances, it is for free; it is a grant. They are getting this for free, plus a great deal of backup, so that is a very good service and I have been around and seen lots of housing projects and people's homes and old- age people's sort of community centres in Grouville and elsewhere and they think it is terrific for their centre.

The Deputy of St. Martin :

Do you have any idea (it does not immediately jump out and it may well be in here) of a unit basis? Do you have any idea what percentage of the previous unit consumption people were saving as a percentage basis from the year following the money they have spent? I mean, how much of their total energy bill or how many units of their total energy bill are they saving after the work has been done? Have we any idea?

Chairman, Jersey Energy Trust:

I think we could probably work it out for you. I have not looked at that. I mean, because of the price changes and so forth and therefore, you would need to start with the amount of carbon that was being saved and then the amount of energy that was being saved, as it were, through the meter and then you would have to compare the new price with the old price and it might ...

The Deputy of St. Martin :

I was thinking more of units, or rather units of energy; rather than carbon or financially.

Chairman, Jersey Energy Trust: Okay, we could probably do that.

The Deputy of St. Martin :

I mean, that is quite an interesting point. I will move on.

Chairman, Jersey Energy Trust:

If you would like that, we could do a couple of sums and let you have the answer.

The Deputy of St. Martin :

Yes. The reason I was looking at percentage savings was that when you come to the summary of the Energy Plan that the Minister is putting forward, we see that under the domestic sector in demand management policy that the energy efficiencies which are going to be saved by applying measures to the pre-1997 stock of properties is nearly 30 per cent, 29 per cent. I just wanted your reaction to that figure and whether you think that it is, you know, potentially possible to save nearly a third of our total demand management in these coming years by working hard on those older properties?

Chairman, Jersey Energy Trust:

Well, the older properties are the easy ones in terms of saving. You get a big hit because they are very inefficient. So, in that sense, the pre-1997 properties would probably come close to that figure. The post-1997 are now running up, anything that would go near B.R.E.E.A.M. 2, then obviously that would drop away very fast. So I think, yes, they could be there. It is a target, it is an ambition and it is based to some extent on the experience that we have had in the sector that we would be dealing with. The fact that there are pensioners in those houses does not make any difference. The houses are the houses and they are very largely inefficient and I would guess that those sorts of houses and those sorts of conditions would probably be replicated even in the able to pay sector. People probably spend a bit more money.

The Deputy of St. Martin :

When we get into the able-to-pay sector, do you feel that we are going to need the carrot or the stick to get to the savings and make the economies that we are looking for? Are we going to have to get eventually to a point where regulation is going to have to step in if we are really determined to make these savings?

Chairman, Jersey Energy Trust:

Well, the easy answer is both. My experience in public life is that incentives work better than threats, usually, and maybe the Jersey character is quite disposed towards incentives.

The Deputy of St. Martin :

A normal typical Jerseyman, I might say.

Chairman, Jersey Energy Trust:

So, I would hope if we can set up incentives rather like the revolving fund, rather like other things that we are contemplating doing, that people will see that because the return, as you said, is 5 years which is a pretty short time, it is quite a considerable return. While  we take a view that fracking has changed the energy equation in the world and that now it is cheap energy and you do not have to worry, forget about the environmental aspects now that the United States is becoming energy self-sufficient and it is exporting energy; that the endless ratchet of Middle East stores of oil and gas is going to break and energy prices will come down and so forth. I do not take that view because I take the view that the world is developing very fast and the so-called developing countries are now becoming major energy consumers and therefore, as it were, the slack is going to be more than taken up by other users. I therefore expect to find that those sorts of inducements, when people see for example, this year they have to heat at least a month more than they normally do, people's bills are now coming through and I am sure that your friends are telling you that it is a nasty shock because their bill is a great deal higher than it was last year. That is the sort of thing that people say: "Oh well, can I do something about that? Should I put in an air-heat exchange pump? Should I put in some insulation or whatever it is?" So I would try incentives before we start rooting out the people who do the stick as a regulatory and legislative thing. I am pretty hopeful that we will get there on self-interest and incentives, or a large part of the way.

[14:45]

The regulation I think should be looking at standards: standards of building, standards of work. There are 2 parties to this. One is the industry, and the Director for Environmental Policy and I have met people from the building trades and they see a work stream for 20 to 30 years. They think it is terrific. We say to them, it is not my job and I did say to them, you have got to put your house in order. You have got to get standards up. No fly by night cowboys who come and do a sort of Del-Boy' job on a house. They have got to be at a high standard and if they do, then they have a cash flow and a business and a growing business if we are going to give the work to S.M.E.s (Small and Medium Enterprises) rather than the big guys who do the smart housing estates. You have a chance of developing a branch of the Jersey economy which will be long term, stable, growing and at a reasonably skilled level which can only be good for the economy and in the state in which we are in arguing about Europe and off-shore and all that, that would be a thoroughly desirable thing. That comes under the economic commercial point that I was talking about. They were willing to have a go at that. So they have to put their house in order but I have to say, with due respect, that the administration of Jersey also needs to put its house in order.

The Deputy of St. Martin :

I was going to come on to that.

Chairman, Jersey Energy Trust:

It needs to set out the systems if we are going to do this. If for example, the State guarantees the loans, it has got to have a proper procedure, a proper agreement with the banks as to what they are guaranteeing and under what circumstances, how any defaults might be triggered and where the responsibility lies, where the, as it were, inspection and certification will lie. Will it lie with the E.E.S.? Will it lie with the Environment Department? Will it lie with the Housing Department? Who will do that? There is a lot of internal work in my view which needs to be done and I think it would be unwise to rush ahead until both the industry were clear that they have done that and I personally think - I am not allowed to do it because it is not, you know - that we should spend some of this money on training, some of the money that I have, the Trust has, on training these people, getting standards up. So both sides of that fence need to be set up to go so that when we do go, the Government is able to handle this programme without problems and the industry is able to do its side and do it at a high standard.

The Deputy of St. Martin :

In the Energy Plan, there are references to both domestic and environmentally commercial changes in the building bylaws to include new builds up to a new specification. What was the reaction from the industry when they saw that, in your experience?

Chairman, Jersey Energy Trust:

We talked to people. The Director for Environmental Policy and I had a meeting with the industry and sort of went over it and said: "Okay chaps, there is a real opportunity coming your way, if this goes through. The Island Plan, the Energy Plan is agreed" and we said: "What are you going to try and do about this? Are you going to try and just take it as an add-on to your normal building, you know, Dandara and Plémont and all that stuff, or are you going to treat it as a serious work stream going through to 2050?" We hope it is the latter. It is not my job to say that but I am saying that because I believe that that comes under the economic aspect. We did not discuss the actual regulations but the people we were talking to I am absolutely sure would think that was a thoroughly good idea because they are also motivated by a desire to meet our creative protocol. They are also motivated by a desire to do good for the environment, build houses that people want to live in which are efficient and economical to live in.

The Deputy of St. Martin :

Do you see conflicts coming between the Planning Department and the Environment Department as to how houses are going to be constructed in the future?

Chairman, Jersey Energy Trust:

Well, since they all come to one head, I would hope that they would not. But that is why I was saying the Government has to sort itself out and think about what it is trying to do, define its objectives, define its priorities and then set out the systems to achieve those and there will be balances obviously with Green priorities and environmental and so forth. But that is indeed one of the areas that I think the Council of Ministers, or whoever is going to deal with this thing, are going to have to work through and I am extremely anxious that it should be done thoroughly because I believe we will only get one shot at this. If people's confidence early on is shaken because it does not work for one reason or another, and they say: "Oh a wonderful scheme, we were told all this stuff but when we tried to do it, it simply did not work for us" then they will just switch off and they will not come back, probably. So, although it is, I think, quite appealing to grab a pot of money, I could go to Philip Ozouf and say: "Look, give us some money" perhaps. Maybe he would; maybe he would not. But even if we got the money from the banks, I would not want to use that money until at least the Trust and myself and the Director for

Environmental Policy and as it were from inside the Government and people in the Government were confident that the 2 bits of the puzzle were meeting and able to deliver.

Deputy J.H. Young: Can I come in there?

Chairman, Jersey Energy Trust: Sure.

Deputy J.H. Young:

I think this raises a subject very much. I think Stephen has led us into this question of what is the framework to manage this strategy, this energy strategy, if it goes through. What I am hearing you say is you have done a lot ... what I think you are all informing us is that you are very advanced in your thinking in terms of the work that you see, a very focused area, but at the moment you are not seeing that the right elements are all in place to give you confidence that this can succeed and you are looking for the Government to organise itself appropriately. Now, in the plan, the plan talks about a thing called an "Energy Partnership" which I think for me is a kind of a quango on top of a quango, if you like. You are already a very focused quango. We have already got another one. What are your views about this structure? Is this the right way to go, layers of quangos to manage what is a major Government plan?

Chairman, Jersey Energy Trust:

Well, let me see now. Just revise a bit. I mean, I am not saying I do not think the Government are able to do this. What I am saying is that the Government requires as part of their input into this plan, it is no good just laying the plan in front of the Members in the House and saying: "Please approve it." As part of that, they should be in a position to say: "If you do, then this is what we are going to do to make it work."

Deputy J.H. Young:

But that is implementation, is it not? That is implementation of the detail.

Chairman, Jersey Energy Trust:

Well, no. In a sense, it is capacity building, which is a cliché. But it is setting up the institutions and the bodies that will be responsible for the implementation and ensuring that those bodies are harmonious and working to a set plan. This is a cross-departmental plan.

Deputy J.H. Young:

So where do you see that being done? You have clearly made a case that you want that to be in place before we start extending, the States extend your mission, and you know, broadening out in the way you said. Where do you see that being put in place? Do you think that sits within the Minister for Planning and Environment? Can he do that?

Chairman, Jersey Energy Trust:

Well, the Minister for Planning and Environment is the lead Minister in this area. Obviously, I worked in I do not know how many Cabinet Office committees in London where you go across a whole range of departments. There is the Housing Department, there is the Transport Department and all the other departments which are directly involved in this. So, he might well take the lead but he would need to do it in co-ordination and co-operation with his colleagues and they, wherever the plan is going to be, and most, quite a lot of them will not affect me. I am not involved in the transport side, for example. But there would need to be 2 things. One is structures and the second is objectives and clarity. You are asking me about structures. Is the Energy Partnership the right structure, I think, for guiding this?

Deputy J.H. Young: Yes, indeed, yes.

Chairman, Jersey Energy Trust:

I could give you a professional answer which would be yes and no which is what diplomats tend to do when they want to have an exit somewhere behind them. But in truth, the requirement is that policy in the energy field, which affects all these departments, has to be co-ordinated. It cannot happen if one Minister is backing against another Minister and there is no acceptance that this policy in transport or housing or whatever it is, are in a hole and the Ministers who are responsible for delivering that policy, and they are not always going to be the Minister for Planning and Environment. They are going to be, as it were, departmental, sectoral Ministers who have got to do that, are in agreement with what has been proposed and in agreement with the way in which it will be monitored and implemented. Now, you can think of various ways of doing it. The one in the plan says there will be, as it were, a body which is the Energy Partnership on it. It will be chaired by the Minister for Planning and Environment. It will have on it the Minister for "X, Y and Z"; it will have on it the head of the J.E.C.; it will have on it the Chairman of the Jersey Energy Trust, in here at the moment; it will have on it the Chairman of the Jersey Renewables Commission and all that. So really, that is what there will be. Once it gets above 14, it is very difficult to operate serious policy monitoring. Whether it is right or wrong is really not particularly for me. I would hope it would be smaller rather than larger because I do not believe it wants to get above about 15 or so. I have watched the Cabinets working in the U.K. and at 22 or 23 around a table, you end up with a great deal of inefficiency because it is simply too much. So, it would need to be selective, carefully selective about who was on it: obviously, on the ministerial side, those Ministers who have a direct responsibility; on the N.G.O. side, those N.G.O.s who are already in the field contributing, Renewable Energy, ourselves. Whether you want to have a representative from a number of the other bodies, some of whom you have taken evidence from, also on there to give them a chance to air their views, that is a matter for judgment. I am not confident and I do not want to make a judgment about them but whatever you do, you are going to have to have an oversight body in which all of the operational interests and budgets of the Ministers concerned are engaged. If you do not do that, then you will have a running battle and I have seen it happen in Whitehall many times, where people just resist.

Deputy J.H. Young:

Well, thank you for that. I think you have covered that very well. Before I hand over to my colleague again, I want to ask you a much more focused question. You have said, I think, you want this framework in place before we start expanding the brief and spending more on committing ourselves. What do you think needs to be spent in money terms to deliver the savings that we are talking about, the savings in energy, savings in money, in residential existing homes, in the future? You said that industry saw it as a task for, I think, 30 years?

Chairman, Jersey Energy Trust: It runs up to 38 years.

Deputy J.H. Young:

What is the scale of the resource that is going to go into this?

Chairman, Jersey Energy Trust:

Well, Mr. Chairman, I think that, if I might say so, I would revise a bit your assumption. What are we going to put into it? What resources are we going to ...

Deputy J.H. Young:

Okay, well what resources are we going to ask private people to put in themselves?

Chairman, Jersey Energy Trust:

Yes. At the moment, the resources are the resources which come out of the vehicle emissions and the States are putting nothing other than officers' time

Deputy J.H. Young:

I understood that but in the future you are advocating a shift away from that, are you not? You are saying ...

Chairman, Jersey Energy Trust:

I am saying that there are various schemes which I think would be beneficial, which would get a bigger impetus, a bigger buy-in from people, and one of them might involve the States taking on a contingent liability for £5 million to £10 million. That will definitely be resources from the States.

Deputy J.H. Young:

Then you said that would be recycled. I mean, what I am trying to get at is what is the scale of this task? What is in my head is that you have got experience of doing this for 4 years in a chunk of the population, albeit a narrow chunk. What I am trying to get at is what is the size of the task, how will we do, whether it is loans, guarantees, whatever it is, what is the scale of the task in terms of commitment and resources, whoever pays for them?

Chairman, Jersey Energy Trust:

I think that is an unanswerable question. I will give you a sort of initial answer because obviously it is over a huge period. It goes up to 2050, so far as I know.

[15:00]

Things change. Technology changes all the time and new things may arise which will change, as it were, the equation we are working on now. In my view, I believe that in addition to the money that we have got which is roughly a million, and we can do various things with that and we have talked about one or 2 of them, inspections and there are lots of little things where we have set up and commissioned and paid for now a study on how you put in double glazing into historical houses. Lots of people come to us and say: "We are Jersey farmers. We do not have the money to do this. We have got classic farms, the windows are wooden and they are rotting and we just want to know what to do." Or some of the 1(1)(k) say, you know: "What do we do about this historic house? We want to make it more efficient." And so we pay for the smaller things like that which will give them, as it were, the intellectual know how of a property to do that. So there are a lot of little things that we can do. I personally think that it would be good to have quite a flagship programme, the one that we have been discussing which would be a revolving fund. I think that in the first 5 years, a figure between £5 million and £10 million would be an appropriate figure for that to get it going, to get people aware that there is a serious body of money there at a serious discount. We can do that. Once again, all the details will be worked out and none of this is fixed but at least these are the principles. Then we would need to do quite a lot on the P.R. (public relations) side to tell people what was going on and encourage them to go and take part in it and we would do that in variety of ways, with banks and seminars and road shows and stuff which we have done before. So I would think that that would be an important element in that and therefore, on that side at least, leave aside the million, I would say between £5 million and £10 million just ... I mean, this is back of the envelope stuff that I am doing but that would give you a serious body of resources to draw on and if we can get the interest rate right, a seriously attractive body of resources to draw on.

Deputy J.H. Young:

Okay. Now, Constable, you wanted to raise

The Connétable of St. John :

Yes, going back somewhat. How often do you meet up with the Minister and update your programme of works? When was the last time ...

Chairman, Jersey Energy Trust:

Not very often. Essentially we have got our terms of reference. I checked with the new Minister that he was content with it and happy with that. The States votes through every year, as part of the budgetary exercise, the continuation of the Vehicle Emissions Duties fund. So I have assumed that we in the Jersey Energy Trust should continue to do what we are doing and we report to him, he gets his reports and

The Connétable of St. John :

So he gets the report but you do not have a face to face with him?

Chairman, Jersey Energy Trust: I meet him from time to time.

The Connétable of St. John :

Time to time being what, once a year, once every 18 months, every 2 years?

Chairman, Jersey Energy Trust:

I was about to say that time is relative. Once a year would probably be about the sort of period we are talking about so it is not an intense relationship but I know that he has been told what we are doing. He gets the minutes of our meetings and so forth so if he thought we were going seriously off the road, he would have a chance to say: "No, do not do that", whatever it is, but that is roughly how it works at the moment. Incidentally, if I might just add a remark. I think that if I could add one sentence to what I said to you, Chairman, about the Jersey Energy Partnership, I think it is extremely important that if that body comes into effect it does not attempt to micro-manage what is going on down below. If, as a result ... we would report to them obviously and tell them what we are doing, I will be on the board, under the present arrangements. I will report to them and say: "This is what we are doing and these are the targets we have set ourselves and we have slipped here or done this and that." If those Ministers, and it is a temptation for Ministers, the way we work, want to start delving in they will, I think, do considerable harm to the efforts we are making. I regard this as: objectives are set and agreed with the Ministers. We then implement and they overview. If they think that something is going off the rails, they can say so but they do not start saying to me or my successor or whoever: "Why are you doing that?" and "What about Mrs. Smith who has had a difficulty over here?" and stuff. That would be a waste of their time and certainly a waste of ours.

Deputy J.H. Young:

Thank you. I wanted to just clear up one extra thing. When you just answered the Constable's question, you said "once a year". When was the last time you met the Minister to discuss this, please, Sir Nigel?

It should obviously be engraved in my mind in letters of gold but it was about 6 months ago.

Deputy J.H. Young:

Okay, thank you. We are about to get to the point where we can move on to renewable energy. Before I do, I want to give Roger a chance to clear up any points on the energy policy if I can.

Panel Adviser:

Thanks, yes. I would just like to come back to this question of measures in the able-to-pay market. You have mentioned various very constructive things that you would intend to do in this market, subsidised audits. That has been tried in various places, I am sure you are aware. The conversion rate tends to be disappointingly low. One reason as a result of research evidence says that it is because people are worried about the hassle and the uncertainty and can they trust the installer. One attempt to deal with this was the Green Homes Concierge Service in London which folded because it again had very low, very disappointing uptake of what sounded like a very promising measure. I would concur with the question mark that you raised about the Green Deal as a finance vehicle although it is obviously too early to tell. It has only really just got started. Another big question is it is not a framed money mush, you have got to borrow anyway, so it does not add anything to it. So all of these measures seem to be very inconclusive in terms of achieving big changes in the able-to-pay market, nothing like the sort of 80 per cent reductions which the plan is envisaging in existing housing over the period up to 2050. Have you got any evidence or any reason to reassure us that these kinds of measures that appeal to people's enlightened self-interest are going to achieve anything like the impact that the plan is looking for?

By definition, I have no evidence because I am not allowed to discuss it with anyone because we are not into the able-to-pay sector yet. We are sitting waiting for Godot. Until this plan is agreed in part, I cannot go out there and start saying to people: "This is what we are going to do" or "We are going to try this." We take soundings. We talk to people. I am a relative newcomer in Jersey. I am one of those immigrants brought by their wives and until next year I have to watch my Ps and Qs because I only get my quallies then. But when we talk to people and we do programmes and that sort of thing, it is very anecdotal. I believe that Jersey is a different case from London obviously and it is a different case from the U.K. in that it is a community which is much more homogenous and much more closely knit and it is not people travelling off and buying and selling houses all the time and moving out of the area, as it were. So I think there is a different, as it were, clientele here which, if we are skilful and clever, we will be able to appeal to in a more successful way probably than the Green Deal in the U.K. which was done by D.E.C.C. (Department of Energy and Climate Change), as you know, and was a great big programme and the Minister jumps up and make speeches and all the usual stuff goes on and then there is a bit of a discontinuity at the ground level, which is exactly what you have just referred to. I hope that with support from the official side, people like myself or my successor or whoever it is going to be here, we do know about these things. We can go out and enthuse people because really it is in their strong self-interest to do it in the Island and it will be in a sense a bit of a trial and error. We will have to trial what we are going to do. If it does not get the uptake that we want, then we would have to come back and talk to the Ministers and say: "That is not attractive enough. Have you got a stick?"

Deputy J.H. Young:

Do you want to follow that up, Roger, are there any other points?

Panel Adviser:

No, that was the key point. Thank you very much.

Chairman, Jersey Energy Trust:

Yes, or, can we make the carrots taste a bit better, more sugar.

Deputy J.H. Young:

So when you can talk to people, maybe we could get to know them and say this is why

Chairman, Jersey Energy Trust:

That is really what we are the Director for Environmental Policy and her team and the Trust are all sort of sitting a bit like ducks on a pond. We are paddling away underneath the water but we are not allowed to come up above the water because by definition, we are confined to that bit of the pond.

Deputy J.H. Young:

So you have been able to contribute to the strategy but you have not had the full reins to be able to explore these ideas? These are ideas which you have but are not yet tested?

Chairman, Jersey Energy Trust:

That is absolutely right. We have been working them out because on the basis of the experience that we have available in the Trust, we think that these are ideas which could run. On the basis of an accommodation or 2 with the industry it sounds as if they are ideas that would appeal to them as the implementers and the quality controllers but there is no guarantee that they will work. I think they probably will. I am sure that they will not work

exactly as we have envisaged because life does not go like that and we would have to adjust that.

Deputy J.H. Young:

Right, I think that sounds to be a good place to wrap that particular element up and move on now if we can.

The Connétable of St. John :

Sorry, just prior to finishing, Chairman, would you say it can be a bit frustrating at the speed things are moving?

Chairman, Jersey Energy Trust:

Jersey is a very beautiful Island and there are lots of things to see but I think so. It has taken an incredible time to get to the first draft of where we are now.

Deputy J.H. Young:

I think you have sparked a couple of questions. I sure that Steve is champing at the bit.

The Deputy of St. Martin :

No, I am not, I was going to try to make the bridge between your work with the saving energy and reducing people's bills and carbon emissions and your work with the renewable energy and, as I just said, on one hand you are saving units, you are saving carbon. On the other hand, you are trying to create power from the new resources. I am just going to ask the question. If you had to choose between the 2, which one would you think is more important to be getting on with?

Chairman, Jersey Energy Trust:

My answer would be to question you, more important to whom?

The Deputy of St. Martin : To you personally.

Chairman, Jersey Energy Trust: To me personally?

The Deputy of St. Martin : Yes.

Chairman, Jersey Energy Trust:

I am so old that I am going green at the edges. I am quite green. I think it is very important that our generation gets to understand and accept that efficient use of carbon is probably the number one strategic challenge that we face in the rest of this century. I think that now we have gone past. I talk a lot to David King, who is a friend of mine, who was the Government Chief Scientific Adviser. He runs a thing called the Smith School of Enterprise and the Environment and he and his fellow men on the climate change panel said 3 or 4 years ago 250 parts per million of carbon is the limit to which we can go safely. We have now gone through 400 parts per million and you probably saw in the newspapers, and Roger will tell you, that that has last occurred before human habitation started on this planet and it will take a long time to decay. I think the best example, the best simile I know, is that the people I talk to say we are no longer conducting an experiment in a test tube. We are conducting an experiment in the laboratory and we are all in it. We do not know what is going to happen. It is too variable. There are too many unknowns but we are doing something deeply important which can have extraordinary consequences in terms of the way that the global climate changes, the way in which water comes out, and when you look up in the sky and curse the jet stream, you can put it down to that as well. So I think that I come from the environmental side because I do believe it is the biggest challenge of this century combined with population increase, which is going up to 9 billion by the end of the century and therefore I look at my grandchildren and I think to myself I wonder what sort of a world you are going to live in and what sort of unpredictable consequences in terms of population migration from North Africa through to Europe and up here and so forth, all those things which I am sure you all know about. That is where I come from but I believe also that it is a fairly easy message to sell in that, regardless of Armageddon or non-Armageddon or - one or 2 of your colleagues in the States believe that is a completely fictitious argument - the pure self-interest from Jersey's point of view in preserving its fantastic environment, in saving people money, in generating economic activity, is so overwhelmingly obvious that even if you did not believe in the environmental side, I think it would be unwise or foolish not to try to take up the low-hanging fruit of self-interest. So I see the 2 coming together very easily and certainly the people we have been operating with is slightly artificial because they are not putting the money in, the pensioners. Nonetheless, they are all putting the money out. They have got more money in their pockets. Their heating bills are down and they tell us that they are not only warmer and healthier but they are living better to some extent because they can purchase more at a time when life is pretty tough and inflation is going on. So yes, Mr. Green at the edges, but yes, I hope Mr. Realist, because I think it is a realistic policy to do.

[15:15]

Deputy J.H. Young:

Thank you for that very important exposition there. I think what I hear you say is both are important, different sides of the coin if you like, but reasons why we need to do this even if you do not go with the environment line. I want to chat to you about your role on the Renewable Energy Commission.

Chairman, Jersey Energy Trust:

Could I just comment there. Where we would hope to go, when we go on the able-to-pay, would we go to the Chamber and to the S.M.E.s. I think that cafés, hairdressing shops, those sorts of people, who do not have the capacity to look at this stuff and who are working very hard to stay alive. We can materially help their bottom line by saving energy, helping them to save energy. It will make a difference to their survival. It will make a difference to their employment.

Deputy J.H. Young:

Is that in the plan? Is that covered?

Chairman, Jersey Energy Trust: It is not covered, no.

Deputy J.H. Young:

So that would be another area that could be covered?

Chairman, Jersey Energy Trust:

Once you say you will go in the able-to-pay sector, then we will have to work out where we want to go and I think personally that one of the places we should go is in the S.M.E.s because they are the people who really need it.

Deputy J.H. Young:

I think what you have done there, I think you helped us a lot. You have added to what is in here which is good. Going back to the Renewable Energy Commission, now, we have seen a couple of documents which I think are fairly old, when it was called a Tidal Commission. Have you been a member of the Commission throughout its life, Sir Nigel?

Chairman, Jersey Energy Trust: Exactly.

Deputy J.H. Young:

Could you just tell us who the current membership is? I apologise for asking this but it is just a matter of bringing ourselves up to speed.

Chairman, Jersey Energy Trust:

Yes, okay. The Chairman is Dan Murphy, your colleague in the States. The other members are myself, Mike Liston and Alick McIntosh who runs an environmental business and he is a commercial operator doing great work in Africa at the moment and I think that is about it. So it is quite a small body. We have, as it were, government ... Mike Liston runs alternative energy companies himself so he is a section operator.

Deputy J.H. Young:

Do you have any resources and funds?

Chairman, Jersey Energy Trust:

We have fairly minimal funds. We are all non-paid. We are voluntary and the money that we have spent so far has been on things like paying for ADCP (Acoustic Doppler Current Profiler) surveys of the sea between Gorey and France to see what the tidal flows are like and whether it looks, as it were, that there are resources there which are exploitable.

Deputy J.H. Young:

The sources of those funds are the Environment budget, are they?

Chairman, Jersey Energy Trust:

We come and bend our knee to the Director for Environmental Policy and, if we are nice to her, she gives us the money.

Deputy J.H. Young: Right, so Environment.

Chairman, Jersey Energy Trust: It is Environment.

Deputy J.H. Young:

So, again, it is a structure under the Minister for Planning and Environment?

Chairman, Jersey Energy Trust:

It is run out of the Environment ministry.

Deputy J.H. Young:

Sorry, I interrupted you. So you have done surveys. You made a submission to the ...

Chairman, Jersey Energy Trust: To the Ministers of the States.

Deputy J.H. Young:

to the Energy Plan.

Chairman, Jersey Energy Trust: Yes.

I wonder if you could briefly sum up what are the key things that Jersey needs to do in order to progress forward with renewable energy sources?

Chairman, Jersey Energy Trust:

I think I would start from the point of view that the survey and the firm that did it gave us a reassurance that we had a resource. There was something serious there. There was something that could be harvested and exploited so it was not just a chimera which we were searching after. On the basis of that, we reported to the States through the Minister and said yes it is there. We believe it would be beneficial to exploit it. What we need to do now is to set up the framework which would be attractive to a developer and that framework will consist of legal certainty, do we have legal certainty that we can use the seabed? As you will see from the papers, we took a bit of time to identify the fact that it was not the Crown Estate but the Duke of Normandy who owns those seabeds and we had to track her down and we did and now we know who the representative of the Duke of Normandy is. So we are able to negotiate and we are indeed in negotiation with them through Philip Bailhache . So on the legal side, we are pursuing various options, either a long lease or a purchase, but our aim is to be in a position to give complete legal certainty to any developer who would be prepared to invest a large amount of money to exploit those resources. The second is then the commercial framework. What will be the commercial agreements and conditions under which the developer will be allowed to exploit them? There are, I have to say, some illusions in some quarters among some Members in the States, I think, about the fact that we would be the Texas of Western Europe, that there will be a huge access to selling energy. I doubt that. I think that since the States - maybe they will change their mind - are not going to invest a large amount of money to help that development, the burden of

that will fall on the developer so the return will be to the developer more than the States. I do not rule out the possibility that the States might take a royalty or whatever they want to do. Alderney have sold their rights to EDF Energy, £250,000, so there are possibilities for doing that but the real benefit will be in security of supply through to the end of the century at rates which are more under our control or more open to discussion by the representatives of the people of Jersey because we will be, in a sense, partners with the developer in this area. The third area is the environmental impact side where we will need to have a clear plan in environmental terms about what is permissible and which safeguards all sorts of things from the seabed to fishing and so forth. So there are 3 sort of biggish chunks of work that we are engaged in with the aim of coming to conclusion, getting ministerial, maybe States as well, endorsement of those 3 bits of work so that we then are, as it were, "open for business". We can go to developers and say: "Here is the offer. Would you like to come and talk about it?"

Deputy J.H. Young:

You said that the States may change their mind about investment. Has there been a decision?

Chairman, Jersey Energy Trust:

Not at all, no. It has not got that far because frankly we are not able to tell them from the Commission's point of view the sort of detail they would need to know about it but I venture my own view that it is like everything in life, you pay for what you get. If we are not going to invest, i.e., become co-investors in the development of this, which maybe we will, maybe States Ministers think that this is such a good deal that they would want to, as it were, be partners in this operation in some way with the developer, have a public/private partnership, fine. If we put in, we will get out. If we do not put in, what we will get out will be less.

The work you are doing, is that only on tidal?

Chairman, Jersey Energy Trust:

No, it is wind as well. There are renewables there. The Good Lord, although no doubt it would be very controversial, decided that Jersey should be blessed by having large lumps of granite around its coast on which you can put wind farms as opposed to Denmark, which is probably the biggest wind producer of them all, which had to sink great big concrete blocks into the Baltic Sea and they are difficult, they are eroding, they tilt because of the tidal waves there and they are expensive. If people decide to do that, and you come again to the planning side as to what to have, at the moment, as it were, the Island Plan envisages that offshore wind will be judged by the same criteria as any other application for building and development in Jersey. That may not be appropriate. It might not work particularly well for things out in the sea or it may. These are all the bits and pieces that need to be sorted out and worked through and people to agree on them, and then while we are doing that, and there is no overriding rush because the technology is moving all the time, and as I say it is getting more efficient and so we are not losing out, I do not think. Parenthetically, we have an opportunity to discuss this with Guernsey and to look at the possibility of doing a combined offer to a developer to put in. Guernsey's waters are Sark, leave out Alderney because they have gone their own way, and then you have a much bigger resource but obviously then you have to agree between the 2 Islands as to how they are going to divide it up and what the benefits to each of them will be and so on and so forth.

Deputy J.H. Young:

You do not have to disclose details but is there evidence of commercial interest that would come to Jersey if there were the kind of framework you have advocated in place?

Chairman, Jersey Energy Trust:

Not yet. The consultants we have talked to and the guys who did the survey of the resource say it is a good resource even though the volume and weight of water is way below the Alderney rates. Nonetheless, it is shallow between here and France which means that the cost of installing the equipment is much less. It is not as challenging as a rock wall and so on, so that the deterioration in the equipment is not going be as quick and that it therefore, even though the actual energy that you are getting may be less, the total picture might be more beneficial and so therefore for a developer they might be quite attracted to come here, particularly given that it is unlikely that Jersey will be able to absorb, if this happened in a big way, all the energy. At the moment, and Roger will correct me, there are no really efficient batteries to store the energy. In 100 years' time, you are going to get peak energy at 5.00 a.m. in the morning and 4.00 p.m. in the afternoon. That is what the tides do, it is absolutely clear and set, and unless you produced the stick and told every housewife in Jersey they have got to get up and put their washing machine on at 5.00 a.m. in the morning, you are not going to use that energy. The battery for us will be Europe, France, Italy, wherever. We will put it on there. They are obliged currently to produce 20 per cent of their energy from renewable resources by 2020. They are looking around for providers of renewable energy and very fortunately about a year ago, they changed the regulations to say it would be permissible for energy from outside the E.U. (European Union), which is us, to be counted towards earning their quotas. So Alick McIntosh, who is this chap I referred to, has been off to Italy and they would buy it tomorrow. Very happy. Not particularly good at renewable energy, you see, but once it is on the grid and they bought it, it cancels their

quotas so it does not have to get to Italy. It just has to go on the European grid.

Deputy J.H. Young:

So you have not got evidence but you have got a belief in the work that you have done that there is going to be potential viability there?

Chairman, Jersey Energy Trust:

We believe there is an exploitable resource and we think that if we can get the framework right, in particular the legal ones, we know now because we have talked to the lawyers of some of these companies, that unless it is absolutely the same as the legal status which they have got from Ireland and other places where they are putting it they will not touch it. The risk for them is too high.

Deputy J.H. Young:

Is there a possibility we would have to pay for that? If you do not want to answer on the record, please do not.

Chairman, Jersey Energy Trust: Pay for what?

Deputy J.H. Young: Pay to secure the rights.

[15:30]

Chairman, Jersey Energy Trust:

Yes, indeed. I will answer on the record. We are negotiating about either a lease at applicable rent or nil rent.

Deputy J.H. Young: Right.

Chairman, Jersey Energy Trust:

We might want to buy if it seemed better and that we could therefore offer a more attractive deal to a developer and say it is ours. We own it, here are the deeds. It shows the States owns it.

Deputy J.H. Young:

I thought you said that it is crucial to get that. I am going to hand over to my colleague.

The Connétable of St. John :

On that point, would the deal not be better to have the seabed handed back to the original owners, i.e., the Channel Islands, given the Duke of Normandy...

Chairman, Jersey Energy Trust:

Yes, doing something for her old Bailiwicks?

The Connétable of St. John :

Correct and the old saying goes that the U.K. through the Duchy of Normandy, the Duchy of Normandy own the U.K. so ...

Chairman, Jersey Energy Trust: Absolutely. That would be

The Connétable of St. John :

It is a ...

Chairman, Jersey Energy Trust: We could try that but ...

Deputy J.H. Young:

Deputy Luce , do you want to get in?

The Deputy of St. Martin :

Yes, I just wanted to come back to the Minister's Pathway 2050 Energy Plan and when it comes to renewables, there is a section on offshore utility scale renewable energy but there is very little numbers but it does say this: "By 2025, consideration by the States of an offshore renewable energy project accompanied by an economic analysis and appraisal of funding options and the impacts on security and affordability of supply" and I would like to ask the question, Sir Nigel. Do you not think under the circumstances that we should be doing more than considering something between now and 2025? Should we not be taking some bold decisions and getting out there doing some proper work?

Chairman, Jersey Energy Trust:

That is rather like asking a vegetarian whether he likes vegetable curry. I find, and please do not regard this in any way as if I was trying to be clever or anything, I always find in government discourse that it is very helpful to define "we" and "they" and "who" because that is what makes things happen. It is very easy to say: "We should leave Europe" or "We should join Europe." In the "we" here, I assume you are talking about the government side being active in this area and I think that would be a good thing but it has costs. If you wish, we get roughly 2 quarts out of the Director for Environmental Policy's pint pot at the moment. There are 3 people there working with her and they produce an astonishing out-turn of work. In any of these things which are interdepartmental, you have got to have, as it were, some officials who are going to keep the show on the road and make sure they meet and get to their targets and do that stuff. So I think one part of the answer would be yes, if you are prepared to vote the resources for it. I think that would be a good idea. The second, I think, is that it would be a good thing if we scored some wins early on, that is to say some of these we have been discussing beforehand so there is a feeling of success, there is a feeling of momentum going down this thing and then I think that obviously, for you and your colleagues to decide, there would be a greater willingness and appetite to vote the resources to reinforce success. That is why I came to the point of view that it has to succeed to start with and then people say: "Yes, great, we would like to do more of it and here is an area which is clearly a good area to invest in and do things in" and then you will get a reply back, presumably from your ministerial colleagues, and your committee will be examining people, and they will probably say to you: "We cannot do that because we are doing all that. All our resources are occupied doing this and we do not have the capacity to do that yet." You might say: "If we gave you the capacity, would we able to do more?" and the answer probably is yes and I think it would be a good thing. So yes, one would like to move ahead as rapidly as possible on all fronts. I think realistically myself that it will have to be a sort of, to use that terrible modern cliché, "a journey" in which I hope that we will get early on ...

The Deputy of St. Martin :

So when you say we have to succeed to start with, are you referring that success back to the work you are doing on land with other types of emission savings and that type of thing and then that success is rolled on into renewable energies in the tidal and maybe wind?

Chairman, Jersey Energy Trust:

Yes. I think tidal is really quite an interesting and difficult subject. I talk to a lot of people. Everyone says: "Fantastic, get out there, put the turbines in, get generating, it cannot be wrong. This is a fantastic Jersey resource. Do it" and I say: "That is fine, I am delighted to hear that, but unless we are going to invest, we, the States of Jersey, you, the taxpayers of Jersey, are going to invest in that, you are reliant on a developer" and therefore the route to that goal is the one in which we offer the most attractive package, legal, commercial, environmental, and we induce the developer to come and do it and that is fine, your question, and more on top, but all the way through if you gentlemen are going to follow this through in your committee, I believe you will find that it is always a balance between what we are prepared to invest and what we hope to get out and the timeframe. Environmentally, my timeframe would be as quick as possible. I think probably in practical terms, given the other calls on public finances and so forth, it will probably be slower than one would want from an environmental point of view.

The Deputy of St. Martin :

In very general terms, is it tens of millions, or hundreds of millions? I am ...

Chairman, Jersey Energy Trust: To do what?

The Deputy of St. Martin :

To get involved financially like you are suggesting if the States are going to take this ...

Chairman, Jersey Energy Trust:

These were figures chucked about earlier on.

The Deputy of St. Martin :

I am not asking for anything specific.

Chairman, Jersey Energy Trust:

But it is upward of £50 million, £50 million to £100 million, that sort of thing. Now, that is absolutely not a reliable figure and you cannot rely on it but it is a figure that was quoted. Obviously as the technology improves, it comes down but it is a very sizeable chunk of money.

The Connétable of St. John :

But at the same time, it is no different to putting a cable from here to France. That is £65 million, £60 million and that is the 25-year life.

Chairman, Jersey Energy Trust:

Yes, absolutely, and you get environmentally very green energy because it is generated in a nuclear reactor. So the actual environmental argument, and you will see from Jersey's figures that there was a big jump or drop when we closed down the powerhouse and moved over to EDF. I will not give you my own views on negotiating with France because I have done it a great deal in my life. It is very unusual to get a free breakfast or a generous breakfast and therefore I think that, as it were, the cost will tend to go up a little bit. Any time that the J.E.C. negotiate with EDF, you know, they find it a bit tougher to get those sorts of deals that they want but they do very well and they have done it very well. So far so there is no reason to doubt that they could probably do it in the future but that is the other party because, as I said at the beginning, the battery is Europe. That is where the energy will probably go because it will not be consumable all here. We can put lots of charging points in the car parks and all that sort of thing and I think that it would be very sensible for the Islanders. It is just such a fantastic opportunity to have a completely green transport future. Nowhere in the world, it is a 40-mile an hour upper limit, short distances. Why would we not go to and this is entirely outside my area and the Minister for Transport and Technical Services will probably tell you that I am talking nonsense, but you go to a Smart or any one of those guys and say: "Okay, work with us here. Help us to implement a totally green transport policy" starting with the States here of course, hybrid then electric, and then saying to public transport, hybrid then electric, and then saying to people: "You want to drive the latest 4 x 4, fine, okay, but you pay. You pay for the emissions you are creating" and they are doing so because that is where the money comes from. But there will be a big social and other incentive to go electric and to have an Island which is not polluted by emissions as it is sometimes in St. Helier as you know in the summer where it sits all day and lots of stuff hangs around. All of those sort of things are potentially available to us and they have a symbiotic relationship with the way in which you generate the energy.

Deputy J.H. Young:

Can I ask, is that a vision or have you done numbers to show that that is a real prospect? Can you explain ...

Chairman, Jersey Energy Trust:

We did a bit, Alick McIntosh did it under the A.G.E.S. rubric which is passed away so one had an idea. He does it professionally and he was pretty confident that there would be major savings. It is not that easy. The Peugeot 107 is an extremely efficient petrol car, very efficient. The output is very, very low. Nonetheless, the electric side is becoming much more efficient and now I see an awful lot of Peugeot electric cars running around, which is very good, and I believe that it would be possible to showcase Jersey. I am stepping right outside my brief here but I believe that in the arguments we are going to be having about offshore tax havens and so forth, we could present

ourselves as green clean Jersey with a serious environmental policy, one part of which would be a green transport policy which shows that we are not completely obsessed with finances. We are, as a society here, prepared to invest in some worthy aims but this is not my brief and I have no reason to say that except I believe it personally.

Deputy J.H. Young:

No but the numbers on the power generation are and so have you done - those numbers show that is a real - in theory, that ought to be achievable?

Chairman, Jersey Energy Trust:

The power is there. It is on the grid. It is capable of being brought in. We would have an interruption in the cable but that would be put right so the provision of green energy to go into green vehicles is not a problem. The technology, which is mainly about batteries now and how long they last and that sort of stuff, and I do not know whether Roger has an up-to-date thing, but that is the sort of pinch point in the electric thing.

Deputy J.H. Young:

Yes, I think what I am getting at, I have heard it said, for example, that doing the calculations, the amount of power you can generate from the sea ...

Chairman, Jersey Energy Trust: Oh, yes, I see.

Deputy J.H. Young:

... is just not enough. Do you have evidence that that is not true?

Chairman, Jersey Energy Trust:

I do not know if anyone has defined what "enough" is. Enough for what? Enough for the whole Island's total needs? No, it would not be at times because it is periodic, this stuff. Generating from tidal power comes twice a day and in between times a bit like wind power. If the wind drops, you have to have a backup resource. So I am at the moment myself discussing with 3 suppliers here about fitting solar PV and exchange panels to my house and it is clear that although I probably will generate enough electricity to put my account off the grid, during night time when solar PV does not work, our Aga will go on to electric. The electric stuff that will heat the Aga will come off the grid so you will always have to have 2 going around together but it will make a very considerable contribution to this and give us for generations to come which is rather sort of a clichéd thing to say. It will be, in my view, our contribution to the generations in this Island up to the end of the century in a world in which environmental things will become more difficult and give us stability of supply in a world which could become quite dangerous in terms of supplies and we have already seen that and therefore the actual, as it were, cash economic contribution, although considerable, I do not think that is the totality of the benefits that we can get from it.

[15:45]

Deputy J.H. Young:

Thank you for sharing that. Sorry to interrupt you, Steve.

The Deputy of St. Martin : No, that is fine.

Deputy J.H. Young:

Do you want to come back in there, Roger?

Panel Adviser:

Just one thing and it is going right back to the early discussion about partnership, if I may. You argue very cogently that there needs to be a body that can co-ordinate the various interests and budgets and Ministers involved. That sounds like something rather different from advisory partnership. Do you think the partnership, as it is suggested in the policy, is the right sort of vehicle or should we be thinking of something quite different from that?

Chairman, Jersey Energy Trust:

What is in the draft is in the draft and there it is. I am sure that there are other ways of dealing with the issues. The issues I think are really having a coherent, co-ordinated input from the government and a co-operative and enthusiastic partnership from those who are not in the government, that is to say folks like me and my Trust and Dan and his Commission. If those are the 2 objectives, then you can design other ways of doing it, but it requires the government part to respect the non-government part and the non- government part to be co-operative and willing and easy to work with from the government point of view and those are the 2 bits that are put together. I think if you came up with a better idea, then I would not go out on the streets with a banner saying "Save the energy partnership". But I have thought about it a bit. I can see possibilities of doing it differently but that is what is there, it is on the table. I could work with it provided that all the players on that committee, whatever, were clearly directed, had clear terms of reference, and that is very important, and were not intending to micro-manage policies which, to some extent, at least in my area, will be implemented by the Trust and Dan's area implemented by the Renewable Energy Commission and if they are prepared to do that and not try and get their fingers into what Douglas Hurd used to call the "nooks and crannies", then I think it would work.

Is there a case of overlap between these 2 bodies, the Energy Trust and the Renewable Commission? Are they not kind of just different ends of the spectrum of the same task?

Chairman, Jersey Energy Trust:

They obviously were involved in the same areas because we are looking at sort of, as it were, renewable energy. Because we have a cash flow and we have targets and it is important that I, on behalf of the Trust, should be able to tell Ministers that this money is being spent clearly sensibly and for the targets, so we produce all these statistics to show that that is what we are doing, that is a different operation from the one that Dan is operating. He is now trying to set up the building blocks for an offer. He is not involved in overviewing or overseeing any management at the moment. It is, as it were, a much more preparatory phase. Maybe at the end of the day when, as it were, we have done our bit in the able-to-pay sector and Dan and his merry men, including me, put the building blocks together and the ministry and people in the States agree that they are the right building blocks and that is the offer we are going to make, then maybe we might merge the 2 committees but at the moment the work is pretty different. The Director for Environmental Policy, under our guise, does real things. They go to doors and talk to people and ...

Deputy J.H. Young:

I understand that is a different role. Just briefly, how often do you meet on the Energy Commission?

Chairman, Jersey Energy Trust:

On the Energy Commission, it is about once every 3 months, 3 or 4 months. In the meantime, though, Dan goes with the Director for Environmental Policy

and talks with Guernsey, with their people, with the environmental people there, and then there is the Island Council where all the Islands come together and we learn a lot from them, other people, the Scots who are doing tidal power off their coast and the Irish, so under that rubric, they meet and therefore it is a convenient place to meet all your other officials who are doing the same stuff in Guernsey.

Deputy J.H. Young:

Thank you for that. Sir Nigel, I would like to thank you for giving up your time this afternoon. You have been very, very helpful. I want you to thank you for giving up time because you have had nearly 2 hours of concentrated questioning and you have really stretched our minds.

The Deputy of St. Martin :

I do not think there is much doubt he has done most of the talking.

Deputy J.H. Young:

You stretched our minds and ...

Chairman, Jersey Energy Trust:

That is the task of being in the committee, you ask the questions.

Deputy J.H. Young:

... and challenged us to think both strategically and operationally. So thank you for your time and before I close the meeting, there will be a podcast and a transcript of this so it is all on the public record. When will the transcript be available?

Scrutiny Officer:

The transcript should probably be back to us by the beginning of next week. I would then share it with you just to check that there are no errors.

Deputy J.H. Young:

So you get the opportunity to check it for accuracy. So with that, I want to thank everybody for coming and close the meeting.

Chairman, Jersey Energy Trust:

Just a final word. Thank you very much for having me. I believe this is a serious area of activity now. It has taken a long time to get here and I am delighted that you gentlemen are devoting the time and the interest to doing it. I think that if you can improve the plan and then it is taken through the States, I think it will be the beginning of a seriously beneficial period and just on a personal note, I realise that I ranged very widely and gave lots of personal views. It may be that when we come to the transcript, one or 2 of those might be modified so that they are not picked up by people and misunderstood and misinterpreted but I hope you will continue to bear in mind when I said I am speaking personally, it was personally. It is not the view of the Jersey Energy Trust at the moment.

Deputy J.H. Young:

Maybe with the personal views, we could ...

Chairman, Jersey Energy Trust:

Okay, thanks very much indeed, and I stand by them. It is just that I do not want people to jump up and down and say: "Oh, goodness me. He is saying on behalf of the Trust this is what we do" when this is not so at the moment. [15:52]