Blog: Driving new growth in the East Midlands

First published in Conservative Home, MP for Broxtowe and Co-Chair of the Midlands Engine APPG Darren Henry discusses the launch of the Midlands Engine Hydrogen Technologies Strategy and levelling up our region.

At the last general election, I was proud to be elected on a manifesto that prioritised two of the biggest challenges facing the UK: tackling the climate crisis and delivering levelling up.

This transformative levelling up agenda sits at the heart of the government’s ambitions, and stands to galvanise communities that have historically been under-represented and consistently underfunded.

As Co-Chair of the Midlands Engine All-Party Parliamentary Group (APPG) I believe nowhere is more in need of this commitment than the Midlands, where 38 percent of local authorities have been defined as category one: places with the highest levels of identified need for the government’s Levelling Up Fund.

Levelling up must also actively enable regional collaboration to drive technological advancement and innovation in a range of sectors, by keeping top talent in the region and building on existing expertise.

This exists in our world-leading research institutions, our growing life-sciences and manufacturing sectors, and in our ability to develop and roll-out the technologies which will be key to our transition to a zero-carbon economy, with high-paid, high-skilled green jobs at its heart.

Hydrogen is central to this transition, with the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy (BEIS) forecasting a need for 5GW of  low carbon hydrogen production capacity by 2030.

This represents a huge transformation to our energy system, with potentially staggering impacts for our transport sector, the way we heat our homes and power our heavy industry.

And it is not just the climate that stands to benefit from these plans – with government funding into our hydrogen economy having the potential to unlock £90 billion of private investment and support 440,000 well-paid green jobs in 2030.

The Midlands is perfectly placed to support this target. We have a proud legacy of manufacturing, a history of automotive production, and are placed at the heart of UK freight and logistics.

This proximity to the aviation sector, combined with plans for the East Midlands Development Corporation and the Freeport at East Midlands Airport mean that, as the UK scales up its production of hydrogen, it will be met by a demand for the applied technologies that the Midlands leads on, and that have the power to connect hydrogen generators with consumers.

The Midlands also has the existing industry and academic collaboration, convened by the Midlands Engine, to deliver this transformative step towards maximising the environmental and economic benefits of the fuel of the future, while underpinning the security of our nation’s energy supply.

The Midlands Engine this week launches the pan-regional Hydrogen Technologies Strategy, answering the call made by the Business Department this summer in their own strategy – for business and research all over the UK to collaborate in the shared vision of scaling up hydrogen production and demand.

The Midlands Engine Strategy identifies and connects transformational opportunities through the region’s Hydrogen Technologies Valley.

With a vision to deliver high-quality job creation and economic growth, the strategy provides a framework for the region’s growth in this vital area.

The benefits on offer include the opportunity to generate over 85,000 jobs through the production, storage and supply of hydrogen; over 60,000 jobs through the decarbonising of HGVs and refuelling infrastructure and almost 2,000 jobs supporting the use of hydrogen as an alternative aviation fuel – all with the potential to contribute £10 billion GVA to the Midlands economy.

At the heart of the Midlands Engine’s strategy is a unified vision and desire to collaborate, particularly in the sectors such as manufacturing, energy and transport, which are vital to the low carbon transition.

The strategy will see these sectors, which were once responsible for large-scale emissions, become the key components of a hydrogen economy – where the technologies which the Midlands is renowned for become the driving force in the scale-up of hydrogen supply and demand.

Pan-regional partnerships like the Midlands Engine are key to driving this agenda. Our sustained work is vital in bringing stakeholders together, liaising with government to highlight potential areas for growth and delivering on the needs of businesses and communities.

As we look to recover from the pandemic and level up across the UK, we must encourage these partnerships and existing collaborations to grow and thrive.

That is how we will continue to create environments in which industry expertise can directly shape and guide solutions to the challenges we face as a nation while delivering long-term, transformative change and level up regions across the UK.