Funding secured for Wick High Street regeneration
Plans to redesign Wick High Street have received a share of more than £26m from Transport Scotland (TS).The more than £2m, secured through the Scottish government's Active Travel Infrastructure Fund, is to be used to to make it easier for people to walk, wheel and cycle through the town centre.The plans are part of a wider regeneration project to boost the fortunes of the town, which has suffered from economic and social change over the last few decades.Highland Council leader Raymond Bremner said: "This has been long awaited and we were never sure in the challenging financial times if we would ever be successful."
A number of other projects in the region have also been selected to benefit from the fund.This includes the busy Raigmore Interchange in Inverness which will see a £2m upgrade to make it safer for all road users.Highland Council has also been awarded funding to deliver the Culbokie Active Travel Village project on the Black Isle.The tendering process has begun for the Wick and Culbokie projects with work expected to be completed by the end of March 2026.
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BBC News
4 hours ago
- BBC News
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He has, he says, "lost friends" over political opponents who claim net zero is an expensive dead end are only too ready to is reported that the Prime Minister has asked to review the details of what some newspapers are calling a "postcode pricing" plan. So is the government really ready to risk the most radical shake-up of the UK electricity market since privatisation 35 years ago? And what will it really mean for our bills? Net zero under attack The Energy Secretary, Ed Miliband, is certainly in a fix. His net zero policy is under attack like never before. The Tories have come out against it, green politicians say it isn't delivering for ordinary people, and even Tony Blair has weighed in against Reform UK has identified the policy as a major Achilles heel for the Labour government. "The next election will be fought on two issues, immigration and net stupid zero," says Reform's deputy leader Richard Tice. 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Less so with regional – or, in the jargon, "zonal" - of Scotland, blessed with vast wind resources but just 5.5 million people. The argument goes that if prices were set locally, it wouldn't be necessary to pay wind farms to be turned down because there wasn't enough capacity in the cables to carry all the electricity into England. On a windy day like 3 June, they would have to sell that spare power to local people instead of into a national market. The theory is prices would fall dramatically – on some days Scottish customers might even get their electricity for free. Other areas with lots of renewable power - such as Yorkshire and the North East, as well as parts of Wales - would stand to benefit too. And, as solar investment increases in Lincolnshire and other parts of the east of England, they could also see prices that cheap power could also transform the economics of industry. Supporters argue that it would attract energy-intensive businesses such as data centres, chemical companies and other manufacturing London and much of the south of England, the price of electricity would sometimes be higher than in the windy north. But supporters say some of the hundreds of millions of pounds the system would save could be used to make sure no one pays more than they do those higher prices could also encourage investors to build new wind farms and solar plants closer to where the demand is. The argument is that would lower prices in the long run and bring another benefit - less electricity would need to be carried around the country, so we would need fewer new pylons, saving everyone money and meaning less clutter in the countryside. "Zonal pricing would make the energy system as a whole dramatically more efficient, slashing this waste and cutting bills for every family and business in the country," argues Greg Jackson, the CEO of Octopus Energy, one of the biggest energy suppliers in the commissioned by the company estimates the savings could top £55 billion by 2050 - which it claims could knock £50 to £100 a year off the average bill. Octopus points out Sweden made the switch to regional pricing in just 18 supporters of regional pricing include NESO, Citizens Advice and the head of the energy regulator, Ofgem. Last week a committee of the House of Lords recommended the country should switch to the system. Energy firms push back There are, however, many businesses involved in building and running renewable energy plants that oppose the move."We're making billions of pounds of investments in renewable power in the UK every year," says Tom Glover, the UK chair of the giant German power company RWE. "I can't go to my board and say let's take a bet on billions of pounds of investment."He's worried changing the way energy is priced could undermine contracts and make revenues more uncertain. And he says it risks undermining the government's big push to switch to green energy. The main cost of wind and solar plants is in the build. It means the price of the energy they produce is very closely tied to the cost of building and, because developers borrow most of the money, that means the interest rates they are we are talking a lot of money. The government is expecting power companies to spend £40bn pounds a year over the next five years on renewable projects in the UK. Glover says even a very small change in interest rates could have dramatic effects on how much renewable infrastructure is built and how much the power from it costs."Those additional costs could quickly overwhelm any of the benefits of regional pricing," says Stephen Woodhouse, an economist with the consultancy firm AFRY, which has studied the impact of regional pricing for the power would come as already high interest rates have combined with rising prices for steel and other materials to push up the cost of renewables. Plans for a huge wind farm off the coast of Yorkshire were cancelled last month because the developer said it no longer made economic sense. And there's another consideration, he says. The National Grid, which owns the pylons, substations and cables that move electricity around the country, is already rolling out a huge investment programme – some £60bn over the next five years - to upgrade the system ready for the new world of clean power. That new infrastructure will mean more capacity to bring electricity from our windy northern coasts down south, and therefore also mean fewer savings from a regional pricing system in the are other arguments too. Critics warn introducing regional pricing could take years, that energy-intensive businesses like British Steel can't just up sticks and move, and that the system will be unfair because some customers will pay more than according to Greg Jackson of Octopus, the power companies and their backers just want to protect their profits. "Unsurprisingly, it's the companies that enjoy attractive returns from this absurd system who are lobbying hard to maintain the status quo," he says. Yet the power companies say Octopus has a vested interest too. It is the UK's biggest energy supplier with some seven million customers, and owns a sophisticated billing system it licenses to other suppliers, so could gain from changes to the way electricity is priced, they the clock is ticking. Whether the government meets its clean power targets will depend on how many new wind farms and solar plants are built. The companies who will build them say they need certainty around the future of the electricity market, so a decision must be taken expected in the next couple of weeks. Over to you, Mr Miliband. BBC InDepth is the home on the website and app for the best analysis, with fresh perspectives that challenge assumptions and deep reporting on the biggest issues of the day. And we showcase thought-provoking content from across BBC Sounds and iPlayer too. You can send us your feedback on the InDepth section by clicking on the button below.
