Improved infrastructure key to meeting UK’s growth and climate targets

The second National Infrastructure Assessment (NIA2), conducted by the National Infrastructure Commission, sets out a number of recommendations for transforming the UK’s energy, transport, and other crucial networks over the next three decades. According to the Commission, the government’s commitment to increasing public sector infrastructure investment to approximately £30 billion annually will need to be sustained until 2040. Private sector investment will also need to increase to £40-50bn annually in the 2030s and 2040s.

Infrastructure expert Robbie Owen of Pinsent Masons said the NIA2 report was “noteworthy” for its call for there to be “determined political leadership if the UK’s 2035 net zero goal is not to become even harder to achieve – and to allow the country to capture private sector investment in the meantime”. He added: “The report makes clear that there is no time to lose, despite the approaching general election. The scale of the task has never been bigger and there will be plenty of challenges for the government.”

“The price tag is eyewatering, with total spending needing to increase sharply to between £70bn and £80bn per year in the 2030s and between £60bn and £70bn per year in the 2040s, particularly in transport and energy, compared with an average of around £55bn per year over the last decade. It remains to be seen how and when government, and the opposition, will respond to NIA2, and whether they do so before the general election,” Owen said.

He added: “The task seems larger and more urgent than it was five years ago when the Commission’s first assessment was published – especially given the need to act now to address past failures. Collaboration between the government, industry and regulators will be crucial at what the Commission rightly described as a turning point – do we carry on going backwards or now pick up the pace in investment and delivery?”.

Recommendations set out the report include electrification to decarbonise buildings at scale, with government subsidies for heat pump installations for one-third of households based on income, along with £7,000 of support for others to switch to heat pumps or heat networks. The Commission called for the incorporation of low-carbon, flexible technologies into the national grid to ensure reliability of a highly renewable energy system. Carbon capture and storage (CCS) and hydrogen core networks are proposed as well as many more electric vehicle charging facilities, and a properly integrated rail and road strategy.

The report also recommended the development of additional water supply infrastructure and a reduction in water leakage, alongside the introduction of compulsory water metering to reduce water demand. Urgent reforms to reach a 65% recycling target by 2035 and the phasing out of energy-from-waste plants without carbon capture facilities are also required, according to the report.

The Commission called for improved maintenance of existing roads and targeted enhancements to enhance journey times on underperforming parts of the national road network. It said major public transport upgrades in English cities – including a proposed £22 billion investment in mass transit schemes in cities like Birmingham, Bristol, Leeds, and Manchester – would help to stimulate economic growth, as would a review of rail priorities for the North and Midlands. This recommendation follows the government’s decision to scrap the HS2 project link to Manchester and to sell off the properties it had purchased along the proposed route.

Owen said: “Ministers must learn the lessons from HS2 if they are to successfully deliver future infrastructure projects. That means reviewing governance and delivery arrangements for major rail projects, and working closely with local political leaders to define and develop various new transport schemes following HS2’s cancellation. The government must also give local authorities and cities greater autonomy to fund these mass transit solutions in future.”

He added: “NIA2 is not just about major projects either. The Commission had much to say on further planning reforms to create an effective planning system, more focus on good design through board-level champions, effective community benefit schemes and updated economic regulation. It also expressed confidence in relation to the link between infrastructure and the environment that air quality, water quality and biodiversity could all be improved if the measures in the assessment are implemented.”

“What comes screaming out of the assessment, as well as the recent events relating to HS2, is the need more than ever before to have a proper spatial plan for all economic infrastructure.  We cannot carry on having disjointed, piecemeal and often outdated national policy statements and other strategic planning initiatives and documents if we are to take the very significant steps in infrastructure provision the Commission thinks we need to, whilst securing good public engagement and support,” Owen said.