Heathrow Airport Closure: Resilience and Security

Question

15:40:00

Asked by

To ask His Majesty’s Government what assessment they have made of the implications of the closure of Heathrow airport following an electricity substation fire for the resilience of the electricity grid and the security of such substations.

My Lords, I beg leave to ask the Question standing in my name on the Order Paper. In doing so, I refer to my interest in the register as chair of the National Preparedness Commission.

My Lords, I extend my sympathies to all those affected by what happened at Heathrow. I also wish to praise the efforts of all the people who worked so hard to get Heathrow up and running again. The Government work continuously with industry, regulators and other stakeholders to improve and maintain the resilience and security of energy infrastructure and to minimise the risk of unplanned outages. Alongside Ofgem, my right honourable friend the Secretary of State commissioned the National Energy System Operator to carry out a review to investigate the power disruption to Heathrow. Once we have all the information, we will be best placed to understand any wider lessons to be learned on energy resilience and security for critical national infrastructure.

My Lords, I am grateful to my noble friend for that reply, and I share his comments about the work put in to restore supplies. Some 30 years ago, the IRA had a credible and viable plan to bomb a whole series of substations around London to deprive London of electric power. It was thwarted only through the efforts of MI5 and the Metropolitan Police. Although it now appears that the fire was nothing to do with malicious action, it has demonstrated how significant substations are. What steps are being taken to ensure that substations around the country are properly secure against malicious actors?

My Lords, I thank my noble friend for his work, particularly the work of the National Preparedness Commission. The matter he raises is very important. The Government take the protection of energy infrastructure seriously. We continually work with industry and the regulators to ensure that proportionate security measures are in place at key sites. In relation to what happened, the cause of the fire is still under investigation, and that is why we need to ask NESO to investigate the situation thoroughly. If there are lessons to be learned more generally relating to the issue my noble friend has raised, of course we will take them very seriously.

May I link the previous Question that the Minister has just answered with the current one about security? Is it true that, in this dash for installing green energy, solar panels and heat pumps, the vast majority of these bits of kit are imported? How is it possible to guarantee that our energy infra- structure in coming years will not be covered in a whole load of Chinese chips? Are we in danger of following in the erroneous footsteps of the Germans when they sold their energy soul to Russia for cheap energy and paid for it wholesale later?

My Lords, that is a bit of a stretch from the Question, but I congratulate the noble Lord on his method. We of course look at the issue of Chinese ownership and involvement in the energy sector. We take security risks very seriously. Equally, we take a consistent and long-term strategic approach to managing the UK’s relations with China. On the development of a UK supply chain, I agree with him. It is worth making the point that, even with solar, much of the value of work in installing it is held in the UK, and other parts of the energy sector are too. We are very keen to see the growth of a UK supply chain generally.

My Lords, when the substation caught fire, the Heathrow authorities decided that they needed to reconfigure all their internal electricity network, thereby turning off and back on again all the critical safety and computer systems, despite the fact that two other substations remained available to Heathrow. Does the Minister agree that it is important that both the inquiries that have been announced seek to understand why the Heathrow authorities felt that they were unable to transfer from one substation to another without restarting their computer systems?

My Lords, my understanding is that, in Heathrow’s view, the supply was insufficient to ensure safe and secure operation. Therefore, it proceeded to reconfigure its internal electricity network to enable the resumption of full operations, utilising the other two external supply points. This required hundreds of systems to be safely powered down and then safely powered up, with extensive testing. The Kelly review will analyse all the relevant material concerning the robustness and execution of Heathrow’s crisis management plans and the airport’s response. The review that my right honourable friend the Secretary of State has commissioned from Ofgem will be looking at the issues of energy, the power outage and what lessons we have learned. We will have discussions with Heathrow to make sure that the terms of reference give us a comprehensive picture.

My Lords, it has become apparent over the last couple of days that Heathrow had submitted evidence to the environment committee of the House of Commons regarding the overrating of power requirements in that area, saying it felt that the net-zero pathway was not helping that. We are adding EV charging and heat pump requirements to the network on a daily basis, but not really doing the proper jigsaw puzzles to make this work. Ultimately, the responsibility has to be with Heathrow Airport for not having a back-up supply. I note that data centres in that area, which are hugely energy hungry, have back-up, and they never go out of power.

My Lords, I am sure those are things that need to be looked at and reviewed by Heathrow, and more generally in relation to the grid and network connections, which I think is part of the question the noble Lord raised. We recognise that, in moving to clean power, we need to strengthen both the grid and the network locally. We will be looking at these matters. We have had reports from the National Infrastructure Commission recently. NESO’s work and advice have led to the Clean Power 2030 Action Plan, which sets out proposals on how we are going to reform the grid and expand it to meet some of those issues.

My Lords, last week’s events surely demonstrate how urgently we need strong regional transport infrastructure to complement and supplement airports in and around London. To that end, I am deeply grateful to the Government for their public commitment to the reopening of Doncaster Sheffield Airport. At the risk of a different stretch, can the Minister reassure the House that the Government will deliver on that commitment by ensuring adequate financial investment to support the South Yorkshire Mayoral Combined Authority and the City of Doncaster Council in getting flights off the ground once again?

My Lords, that was a nice try but I am afraid I am not going to respond in the way the right reverend Prelate might wish—although, if we are talking about regional transport hubs, I hope that this year we can celebrate the reopening of the Kings Heath station in Birmingham.

My Lords, do the Government accept—I think this is less of a stretch—that one lesson to be learned is that Heathrow’s lack of contingency and resilience plans means that a third runway is not feasible?

My Lords, I do not take that point at all. Clearly, Heathrow had a resilience plan. One of the points of the investigations is to see how effective it is, and we are mindful of the impact the closure had on thousands of people. The noble Baroness knows that the Government believe that we need to expand Heathrow. It is a hugely important asset to the United Kingdom, but we have to make sure that any expansion is in line with our legal, environmental and climate obligations.

My Lords, on the subject of resilience, businesses and local councils, such as Ealing and Hounslow in west London, have long raised concerns about a lack of capacity and resilience frustrating their plans for growth. As I am sure my noble friend the Minister is aware, this was highlighted by the National Infrastructure Commission’s recent report on electricity distribution networks, in which it cited network constraints in west London brought about by the otherwise welcome installation of data centres—as we have already heard. Does my noble friend agree that we need to reverse the hopeless record on infrastructure investment by the previous Government and invest in a decent, future-proof grid which can cope with better growth for Heathrow and with homes and businesses in west London?

The noble Lord is right; this Government are having to invest huge amounts into the infrastructure, which was neglected by the party opposite for years. He is right about the National Infrastructure Commission. It produced a report in February that said that, with demand for electricity set to double by 2050, the current pace of additional investment in the country’s electrical distribution networks needs to double. We are giving that earnest consideration.