Or, rather, it\u2019s half a response since this was an interim version cloaked in the language of \u201cmore analysis needed\u201d. But one significant shift was reasonably clear: the government thinks it will probably have to intervene to ensure sufficient gas capacity and infrastructure is in place. That could mean contracts to underpin more storage, more import terminals or something else.<\/p>\n
24m UK households have a gas connection, which they rely on for heating and eating. Photograph: Murdo MacLeod\/The Guardian<\/p>\n
There are three observations to make about this report<\/a>. First, ministers need to hurry up and decide what they want, as opposed to repeatedly describing the menu of options. \u201cWe have a responsibility to the millions of households that will be heated by gas for years ahead, the industries that rely on it for essential production and the power system in which gas continues to play a key role,\u201d declared energy minister Michael Shanks. What he did not do, however, was set out a timetable for choosing what kit is needed and by when.<\/p>\n If, for example, regeneration of Centrica\u2019s Rough storage site off the coast of Yorkshire is one solution, that \u00a32bn project won\u2019t happen overnight. Nor could alternative onshore or offshore storage facilities, or even floating offshore import terminals, be summoned immediately. If the 2030 risk of running short of gas is real, get on with it.<\/p>\n Second, what about this winter? That challenge wasn\u2019t mentioned. \u201cSwift and decisive action is also required to address potential near-term challenges,\u201d said Jon Butterworth<\/a>, chief executive of National Gas, which runs the gas network, back in February. While he added that \u201cwork is already well under way,\u201d it is hard to find anybody who can describe what has been done in response to the disruption to global LNG supplies.<\/p>\n skip past newsletter promotion<\/a>Free newsletter | Every weekday<\/p>\n Sign up to Business Today<\/p>\n Get set for the working day \u2013 we’ll point you to all the business news and analysis you need every morning<\/p>\n after newsletter promotion<\/p>\n Centrica has not been injecting gas into Rough this year<\/a> because it can\u2019t make the finances stack up, meaning Britain will enter winter with even less storage than usual. In the meantime, continental European storage, which Britain normally taps via interconnectors during the cold months, is projected to be lower than average for Hormuz-related reasons. And wholesale gas prices are rising, amid anticipated global competition for LNG cargoes.<\/p>\n Third, Tuesday\u2019s report was not about North Sea policy, but represented another reason to approve the Jackdaw gasfield<\/a>. It would, after all, be bizarre to outline a potential supply crunch that has been caused, in large part, by growing reliance on imports, and then disallow a field that will make the problem slightly smaller. Jackdaw will account for about 6% of domestic North Sea gas volumes and could be up and running in time for winter. Whatever the awkward \u201coptics\u201d<\/a>, there is another decision to make soon.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The penny is dropping in government. Britain, even in rapid energy transition mode, will still need a lot…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":742536,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[84,59,56,54,55],"class_list":["post-742535","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-business","tag-business","tag-gb","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom","tag-unitedkingdom"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/742535","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=742535"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/742535\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/742536"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=742535"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=742535"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=742535"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/06\/500.jpg\")
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